Podcast appearances and mentions of Martin Amis

In this Write Big session of the #amwriting podcast, host Jennie Nash welcomes Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Jennifer Senior for a powerful conversation about finding, knowing, and claiming your voice.Jennifer shares how a medication once stripped away her ability to think in metaphor—the very heart of her writing—and what it was like to get that voice back. She and Jennie talk about how voice strengthens over time, why confidence and ruthless editing matter, and what it feels like when you're truly writing in flow.It's an inspiring reminder that your voice is your greatest strength—and worth honoring every time you sit down to write.TRANSCRIPT BELOW!THINGS MENTIONED IN THIS PODCAST:* Jennifer's Fresh Air interview with Terry Gross: Can't Sleep? You're Not Alone* Atlantic feature story: What Bobby McIlvaine Left Behind* Atlantic feature story: The Ones We Sent Away* Atlantic feature story: It's Your Friends Who Break Your Heart* The New York Times article: Happiness Won't Save You* Heavyweight the podcastSPONSORSHIP MESSAGEHey, it's Jennie Nash. And at Author Accelerator, we believe that the skills required to become a great book coach and build a successful book coaching business can be taught to people who come from all kinds of backgrounds and who bring all kinds of experiences to the work. But we also know that there are certain core characteristics that our most successful book coaches share. If you've been curious about becoming a book coach, and 2026 might be the year for you, come take our quiz to see how many of those core characteristics you have. You can find it at bookcoaches.com/characteristics-quiz.EPISODE TRANSCRIPTJennie NashHi, I'm Jennie Nash, and you're listening to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast. This is a Write Big Session, where I'm bringing you short episodes about the mindset shifts that help you stop playing small and write like it matters. This one might not actually be that short, because today I'm talking to journalist Jennifer Senior about the idea of finding and knowing and claiming your voice—a rather big part of writing big. Jennifer Senior is a staff writer at The Atlantic. She won the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing in 2022 and was a finalist again in 2024. Before that, she spent five years at The New York Times as both a daily book critic and a columnist for the opinion page, and nearly two decades at New York Magazine. She's also the author of a bestselling parenting book, and frequently appears on NPR and other news shows. Welcome, Jennifer. Thanks for joining us.Jennifer SeniorThank you for having me. Hey, I got to clarify just one thing.Jennie NashOh, no.Jennifer SeniorAll Joy and No Fun is by no means a parenting book. I can't tell you the first thing about how to raise your kids. It is all about how kids change their parents. It's all like a sociological look at who we become and why we are—so our lives become so vexed. I like, I would do these book talks, and at the end, everybody would raise their hand and be like, “How do I get my kid into Harvard?” You know, like, the equivalent obviously—they wouldn't say it that way. I'd be like; I don't really have any idea, or how to get your kid to eat vegetables, or how to get your kid to, like, stop talking back. But anyway, I just have to clarify that, because every time...Jennie NashPlease, please—Jennifer SeniorSomeone says that, I'm like, “Noooo.” Anyway, it's a sociology book. Ah, it's an ethnography, you know. But anyway, it doesn't matter.Jennie NashAll right, like she said, you guys—not what I said.Jennifer SeniorI'm not correcting you. It came out 11 years ago. There were no iPads then, or social media. I mean, forget it. It's so dated anyway. But like, I just...Jennie NashThat's so funny. So the reason that we're speaking is that I heard you recently on Fresh Air with Terry Gross, where you were talking about an Atlantic feature story that you wrote called “Why Can't Americans Sleep?” And this was obviously a reported piece, but also a really personal piece and you're talking about your futile attempts to fall asleep and the latest research into insomnia and medication and therapy that you used to treat it, and we'll link to that article and interview in the show notes. But the reason that we're talking, and that in the middle of this conversation, which—which I'm listening to and I'm riveted by—you made this comment, and it was a little bit of a throwaway comment in the conversation, and, you know, then the conversation moved on. But you talked about how you were taking a particular antidepressant you'd been prescribed, and this was the quote you said: “It blew out all the circuitry that was responsible for generating metaphors, which is what I do as a writer. So it made my writing really flat.” And I was just like, hold up. What was that like? What happened? What—everything? So that's why we're talking. So… can we go back to the very beginning? If you can remember—Jess Lahey actually told me that when she was teaching fifth and sixth grade, that's around the time that kids begin to grasp this idea of figurative language and metaphor and such. Do you remember learning how to write like that, like write in metaphor and simile and all such things?Jennifer SeniorOh, that's funny. Do I remember it? I remember them starting to sort of come unbidden in my—like they would come unbidden in my head starting maybe in my—the minute I entered college, or maybe in my teens. Actually, I had that thing where some people have this—people who become writers have, like, a narrator's voice in their head where they're actually looking at things and describing them in the third person. They're writing them as they witness the world. That went away, that narrator's voice, which I also find sort of fascinating. But, like, I would say that it sort of emerged concurrently. I guess I was scribbling a little bit of, like, short story stuff, or I tried at least one when I was a senior in high school. So that was the first time maybe that, like, I started realizing that I had a flair for it. I also—once I noticed that, I know in college I would make, you know, when I started writing for the alternative weekly and I was reviewing things, particularly theater, I would make a conscientious effort to come up with good metaphors, and, like, 50% of them worked and 50% of them didn't, because if you ever labor over a metaphor, there's a much lower chance of it working. I mean, if you come—if you revisit it and go, oh, that's not—you know, that you can tell if it's too precious. But now if I labor over a metaphor, I don't bother. I stop. You know, it has to come instantaneously or...Jennie NashOr that reminds me of people who write with the thesaurus open, like that's going to be good, right? That's not going to work. So I want to stick with this, you know, so that they come into your head, you recognize that, and just this idea of knowing, back in the day, that you could write like that—you… this was a thing you had, like you used the word “flair,” like had a flair for this. Were there other signs or things that led you to the work, like knowing you were good, or knowing when something was on the page that it was right, like, what—what is that?Jennifer SeniorIt's that feeling of exhilaration, but it's also that feeling of total bewilderment, like you've been struck by something—something just blew through you and you had nothing to do with it. I mean, it's the cliché: here I am saying the metaphors are my superpower, which my editors were telling me, and I'm about to use a cliché, which is that you feel like you're a conduit for something and you have absolutely nothing to do with it. So I would have that sense that it had almost come without conscious thought. That was sort of when I knew it was working. It's also part of being in a flow state. It's when you're losing track of time and you're just in it. And the metaphors are—yeah, they're effortless. By the way, my brain is not entirely fogged in from long COVID, but I have noticed—and at first I didn't really notice any decrements in cognition—but recently, I have. So I'm wondering now if I'm having problems with spontaneous metaphor generation. It's a little bit disconcerting. And I do feel like all SSRIs—and I'm taking one now, just because, not just because long COVID is depressing, but because I have POTS, which is like a—it's Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome, and that's a very common sequela from long COVID, and it wipes out your plasma serotonin. So we have to take one anyway, we POTS patients. So I found that nicotine often helped with my long COVID, which is a thing—like a nicotine patch—and that made up for it. It almost felt like I was doping [laughing]. It made my writing so much better. But it's been...Jennie NashWait, wait, wait, this is so interesting.Jennifer SeniorI know…it's really weird. I would never have guessed that so much of my writing would be dampened by Big Pharma. I mean—but now with the nicotine patches, I was like, oh, now I get why writers are smoking until into the night, writing. Like, I mean, and I always wished that I did, just because it looked cool, you know? I could have just been one of those people with their Gitanes, or however you pronounce it, but, yeah.Jennie NashWow. So I want to come—I want to circle back to this in a minute, but let's get to the first time—well, it sounds like the first time that happened where you were prescribed an antidepressant and—and you recognized that you lost the ability to write in metaphor. Can you talk about—well, first of all, can you tell us what the medication was?Jennifer SeniorYeah, it was Paxil, which is actually notorious for that. And at the top—which I only subsequently discovered—those were in the days where there were no such things as Reddit threads or anything like that. It was 1999… I guess, no, eight, but so really early. That was the bespoke antidepressant at the time, thought to be more nuanced. I think it's now fallen out of favor, because it's also a b***h to wean off of. But it was kind of awful, just—I would think, and nothing would come. It was the strangest thing. For—there's all this static electricity usually when you write, right? And there's a lot of free associating that goes on that, again, feels a little involuntary. You know, you start thinking—it's like you've pulled back the spring in the pinball machine, and suddenly the thing is just bouncing around everywhere, and the ball wasn't bouncing around. Nothing was lighting up. It was like a dis… it just was strange, to be able to summon nothing.Jennie NashWow. So you—you just used this killer metaphor to describe that.Jennifer SeniorYeah, that was spontaneous.Jennie NashRight? So—so you said first, you said static, static energy, which—which is interesting.Jennifer SeniorYeah, it's... [buzzing sound]Jennie NashYeah. Yeah. Because it's noisy. You're talking about...Jennie SeniorOh, but it's not disruptive noise. Sorry, that might seem like it's like unwanted crackling, like on your television. I didn't really—yeah, maybe that's the wrong metaphor, actually, maybe the pinball is sort of better, that all you need is to, you know, psych yourself up, sit down, have your caffeine, and then bam, you know? But I didn't mean static in that way.Jennie NashI understood what you meant. There's like a buzzy energy.Jennifer SeniorYeah, right. It's fizz.Jennie NashFizz... that's so good. So you—you recognized that this was gone.Jennifer SeniorSo gone! Like the TV was off, you know?Jennie NashAnd did you...?Jennifer SeniorOr the machine, you know, was unplugged? I mean, it's—Jennie NashYeah, and did you? I'm just so curious about the part of your brain that was watching another part of your brain.Jennifer Senior[Laughing] You know what? I think... oh, that's really interesting. But are you watching, or are you just despairing because there's nothing—I mean, I'm trying to think if that's the right...Jennie NashBut there's a part of your brain that's like, this part of my brain isn't working.Jennifer SeniorRight. I'm just thinking how much metacognition is involved in— I mean, if you forget a word, are you really, like, staring at that very hard, or are you just like, s**t, what's the word? If you're staring at Jack Nicholson on TV, and you're like, why can't I remember that dude's name?Multiple speakers[Both laughing]Jennifer SeniorWhich happens to me far more regularly now, [unintelligible]… than it used to, you know? I mean, I don't know. There is a part of you that's completely alarmed, but, like, I guess you're right. There did come a point where I—you're right, where I suddenly realized, oh, there's just been a total breakdown here. It's never happening. Like, what is going on? Also, you know what would happen? Every sentence was a grind, like...Jennie NashOkay, so—okay, so...Jennifer Senior[Unintelligible]... Why is this so effortful? When you can't hold the previous sentence in your head, suddenly there's been this lapse in voice, right? Because, like, if every sentence is an effort and you're starting from nothing again, there's no continuity in how you sound. So, I mean, it was really dreadful. And by the way, if I can just say one thing, sorry now that—Jennie NashNo, I love it!Jennifer SeniorYeah. Sorry. I'm just—now you really got me going. I'm just like, yeah, I know. I'm sort of on a tear and a partial rant, which is Prozac—there came a point where, like, every single SSRI was too activating for me to sleep. But it was, of course, a problem, because being sleepless makes you depressed, so you need something to get at your depression. And SNRIs, like the Effexor's and the Cymbalta's, are out of the question, because those are known to be activating. So I kept vainly searching for SSRIs, and Prozac was the only one that didn't—that wound up not being terribly activating, besides Paxil, but it, too, was somewhat deadening, and I wrote my whole book on it.Jennie NashWow!Jennifer SeniorIt's not all metaphor.Multiple Speakers[both laughing]Jennifer SeniorIt's not all me and no—nothing memorable, you know? I mean, it's—it's kind of a problem. It was—I can't really bear to go back and look at it.Jennie NashWow.Jennie NashSo—so the feeling...Jennifer SeniorI'm really giving my book the hard sell, like it's really a B plus in terms of its pro…—I mean, you know, it wasn't.Jennie NashSo you—you—you recognize its happening, and what you recognize is a lack of fizzy, buzzy energy and a lack of flow. So I just have to ask now, presumably—well, there's long COVID now, but when you don't have—when you're writing in your full powers, do you—is it always in a state of flow? Like, if you're not in a state of flow, do you get up and go do something else? Like, what—how does that function in the life of a writer on a deadline?Jennifer SeniorOK. Well, am I always in a state of flow? No! I mean, flow is not—I don't know anyone who's good at something who just immediately can be in flow every time.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorIt's still magic when it happens. You know, when I was in flow almost out of the gate every day—the McIlvaine stories—like, I knew when I hit send, this thing is damn good. I knew when I hit send on a piece that was not as well read, but is like my second or third favorite story. I wrote something for The New York Times called “Happiness Wont Save You,” about a pioneer in—he wrote one of the foundational studies in positive psychology about lottery winners and paraplegics, and how lottery winners are pretty much no happier than random controls found in a phone book, and paraplegics are much less unhappy than you might think, compared to controls. It was really poorly designed. It would never withstand the scrutiny of peer review today. But anyway, this guy was, like, a very innovative thinker. His name was Philip Brickman, and in 1982 at 38 years old, he climbed—he got—went—he found his way to the roof of the tallest building in Ann Arbor and jumped, and took his own life. And I was in flow pretty much throughout writing that one too.Jennie NashWow. So the piece you're referring to, that you referred to previous to that, is What Bobby McIlvaine Left Behind, which was a feature story in The Atlantic. It's the one you won the—Pul…Pulitzer for? It's now made into a book. It has, like...Jennifer SeniorAlthough all it is like, you know, the story between...Jennie NashCovers, right?Jennifer SeniorYeah. Yeah. Because—yeah, yeah.Jennie NashBut—Jennifer SeniorWhich is great, because then people can have it, rather than look at it online, which—and it goes on forever—so yeah.Jennie NashSo this is a piece—the subtitle is Grief, Conspiracy Theories, and One Family's Search for Meaning in the Two Decades Since 9/11—and I actually pulled a couple of metaphors from that piece, because I re-read it knowing I was going to speak to you… and I mean, it was just so beautifully written. It's—it's so beautifully structured, everything, everything. But here's a couple of examples for our listeners. You're describing Bobby, who was a 26-year-old who died in 9/11, who was your brother's college roommate.Jennifer SeniorAnd at that young adult—they—you can't afford New York. They were living together for eight years. It was four in college, and four—Jennie NashWow.Jennifer SeniorIn New York City. They had a two-bedroom... yeah, in a cheaper part... well, to the extent that there are cheaper parts in...Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorThe way over near York Avenue, east side, yeah.Jennie NashSo you write, “When he smiled, it looked for all the world like he'd swallowed the moon.” And you wrote, “But for all Bobby's hunger and swagger, what he mainly exuded, even during his college years, was warmth, decency, a corkscrew quirkiness.” So just that kind of language—a corkscrew quirkiness, like he'd swallowed the moon—that, it's that the piece is full of that. So that's interesting, that you felt in flow with this other piece you described and this one. So how would you describe—so you describe metaphors as things that just come—it just—it just happens. You're not forcing it—you can't force it. Do you think that's true of whatever this ineffable thing of voice—voices—as well?Jennifer SeniorOh, that's a good question. My voice got more distinct as I got older—it gets better. I think a lot of people's—writers'—powers wax. Philip Roth is a great example of that. Colette? I mean, there are people whose powers really get better and better, and I've gotten better with more experience. But do you start with the voice? I think you do. I don't know if you can teach someone a voice.Jennie NashSo when you say you've gotten better, what does that mean to you?Jennifer SeniorYeah. Um, I'm trying to think, like, do I write with more swing? Do I—just with more confidence because I'm older? Being a columnist…which is the least creative medium…Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorSeven hundred and fifty words to fit onto—I had a dedicated space in print. When David Leonhardt left, I took over the Monday spot, during COVID. So it's really, really—but what it forces you to do is to be very—your writing becomes lean, and it becomes—and structure is everything. So this does not relate to voice, but my—I was always pretty good at structure anyway. I think if you—I think movies and radio, podcasts, are, like, great for structure. Storytelling podcasts are the best thing to—I think I unconsciously emulate them. The McIlvaine story has a three-act structure. There's also—I think the podcast Heavyweight is sublime in that way.Jennie NashIs that Roxane Gay?Jennifer SeniorNo, no, no, no.Jennie NashOh, it's, um—Jennifer SeniorIt's Jonathan Goldstein.Jennie NashYes, got it. I'm going to write that down and link to that in our show notes.Jennifer SeniorIt's... I'm trying to think of—because, you know, his is, like, narratives, and it's—it's got a very unusual premise. But voice, voice, voice—well, I, you know, I worked on making my metaphors better in the beginning. I worked on noticing things, you know, and I worked on—I have the—I'm the least visual person alive. I mean, this is what's so interesting. Like, I failed to notice once that I had sat for an hour and a half with a woman who was missing an arm. I mean, I came back to the office and was talking—this is Barbara Epstein, who was a storied editor of The New York Review of Books, the story editor, along with Bob Silver. And I was talking to Mike Tomasky, who was our, like, city politic editor at the time. And I said to him, I just had this one—I knew she knew her. And he said, was it awkward? Was—you know, with her having one arm and everything? And I just stared at him and went one arm? I—I am really oblivious to stuff. And yet visual metaphors are no problem with me. Riddle me that, Batman. I don't know why that is. But I can, like, summon them in my head, and so I worked at it for a while, when my editors were responsive to it. Now they come more easily, so that seems to maybe just be a facility. I started noticing them in other people's writing. So Michael Ondaatje —in, I think it was In the Skin of a Lion, but maybe it was The English Patient. I've read, like, every book of his, like I've, you know— Running… was it Running in the Family? Running with the Family? I think it was Running in the—his memoir. And, I mean, doesn't—everything. Anil's Ghost—he— you know, that was it The Ballad of Billy the Kid? [The Collected Works of Billy the Kid] Anyway, I can go on and on. He had one metaphor talking about the evening being as serene as ink. And it was then that I realized that metaphors without effort often—and—or is that a simile? That's a simile.Jennie NashLike—or if it's “like” or “as,” it's a simile.Jennifer SeniorYeah. So I'm pretty good with similes, maybe more than metaphors. But... serene as ink. I realized that what made that work is that ink is one syllable. There is something about landing on a word with one syllable that sounds like you did not work particularly hard at it. You just look at it and keep going. And I know that I made a real effort to make my metaphors do that for a while, and I still do sometimes. Anything more than that can seem labored.Jennie NashOh, but that's so interesting. So you—you noticed in other people what worked and what you liked, and then tried to fold that into your own work.Jennifer SeniorYeah.Jennie NashSo does that mean you might noodle on—like, you have the structure of the metaphor or simile, but you might noodle on the word—Jennifer SeniorThe final word?Jennie NashThe final word.Jennifer SeniorYeah. Yeah, the actual simile, or whatever—yeah, I guess it's a simile—yeah, sometimes. Sometimes they—like I said, they come unbidden. I think I have enough experience now—which may make my voice better—to know what's crap. And I also, by the way, I'll tell you what makes your voice better: just being very willing to hit Select Alt, Delete. You know, there's more where that came from. I am a monster of self-editing. I just—I have no problem doing it. I like to do it. I like to be told when things are s**t. I think that improves your voice, because you can see it on the page.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorAnd also, I think paying attention to other people's writing, you know, I did more and more of that, you know, reverse engineering stuff, looking at how they did stuff as I got older, so...Jennie NashSo I was going to ask a question, which now maybe you already answered, but the question was going to be… you said that you're—you feel like you're getting better as a writer as you got older. And you—you said that was due to experience. And I was going to ask, is it, or is it due to getting older? You know, is there something about literally living more years that makes you better, or, you know, like, is wisdom something that you just get, or is it something you work for? But I think what I'm hearing is you're saying you have worked to become the kind of writer who knows, you know, what you just said—you delete stuff, it comes again. But tell me if—you know, you welcome the kind of tough feedback, because you know that makes you better. You know, this sort of real effort to become better, it sounds like that's a practice you have. Is that—is that right?Jennifer SeniorOh yeah. I mean, well, let's do two things on that, please. I so easily lose my juju these days that, like, you've got to—if you can put a, you know, oh God, I'm going to use a cliché again—if you can put a pin in or bookmark that, the observation about, you know, harsh feedback. I want to come back to that. But yes, one of the things that I was going to keep—when I said that I have the confidence now, I also was going to say that I have the wisdom, but I had too many kind of competing—Jennie NashYeah. Yeah.Jennifer SeniorYou know, were running at once, and I, you know, many trains on many tracks—Jennie NashYeah, yeah.Jennifer Senior…about to leave, so…, Like, I had to sort of hop on one. But, like, the—the confidence and wisdom, yes, and also, like, I'll tell you something: in the McIlvaine piece, it may have been the first time I did, like, a narrative nonfiction. I told a story. There was a time when I would have hid behind research on that one.Jennie NashOoh, and did you tell a story. It was the—I remember reading that piece when it first came out, and there you're introducing, you know, this—the situation. And then there's a moment, and it comes very quickly at the top of the piece, where you explain your relationship to the protagonist of the story. And there's a—there's just a moment of like, oh, we're—we're really in something different here. There's really—is that feel of, this is not a reported story, this is a lived story, and that there's so many layers of power, I mean, to the story itself, but obviously the way that you—you present it, so I know exactly what you're talking about.Jennifer SeniorYeah, and by the way, I think writing in the first person, which I've been doing a lot of lately, is not something I would have done until now. Probably because I am older and I feel like I've earned it. I have more to say. I've been through more stuff. It's not, like, with the same kind of narcissism or adolescent—like, I want to get this out, you know. It's more searching, I think, and because I've seen more, and also because I've had these pent up stories that I've wanted to tell for a long time. And also I just don't think I would have had the balls, you know.Jennie NashRight.Jennifer SeniorSo some of it is—and I think that that's part of—you can write better in your own voice. If it's you writing about you, you're—there's no better authority, you know? So your voice comes out.Jennie NashRight.Jennifer SeniorBut I'm trying to think of also—I would have hid behind research and talked about theories of grief. And when I wrote, “It's the damnedest thing, the dead abandon you, and then you abandon the dead,” I had blurted that out loud when I was talking to, actually, not Bobby's brother, which is the context in which I wrote it, but to Bobby's—I said that, it's, like, right there on the tape—to his former almost fiancée. And I was thinking about that line, that I let it stand. I didn't actually then rush off and see if there was a body of literature that talked about the guilt that the living feel about letting go of their memories. But I would have done that at one point. I would have turned it into this... because I was too afraid to just let my own observations stand. But you get older and you're like, you know what? I'm smart enough to just let that be mine. Like, assume...Jennie NashRight.Jennifer SeniorIt's got to be right. But can we go back, also, before I forget?Jennie NashYeah, we're going to go back to harsh, but—but I would just want to use your cliché, put a pin in what you said, because you've said so many important things— that there's actual practice of getting better, and then there's also wisdom of—of just owning, growing into, embracing, which are two different things, both so important. So I just wanted to highlight that you've gone through those two things. So yes, let's go back to—I said harsh, and maybe I miss—can...misrepresenting what you meant.Jennifer SeniorYou may not have said that. I don't know what you said.Jennie NashNo, I did, I did.Jennifer SeniorYou did, okay, yeah, because I just know that it was processed as a harsh—oh no, totally. Like, I was going to say to you that—so there was a part of my book, my book, eventually, I just gave one chapter to each person in my life whom I thought could, like, assess it best, and one of them, so this friend—I did it on paper. He circled three paragraphs, and he wrote, and I quote, “Is this just a shitty way of saying...?” And then I was like, thank God someone caught it, if it was shitty. Oh my God. And then—and I was totally old enough to handle it, you know, I was like 44, whatever, 43. And then, who was it? Someone else—oh, I think I gave my husband the intro, and he wrote—he circled a paragraph and just wrote, “Ugh.” Okay, Select Alt, Delete, redo. You know, like, what are you going to do with that? That's so unambiguous. It's like, you know—and also, I mean, when you're younger, you argue. When you're older, you never quarrel with Ugh. Or Is this...Jennie NashRight, you're just like, okay, yep.Jennifer SeniorYeah. And again, you—you've done it enough that, you know, there's so much more where that came from.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorWhy cling to anything that someone just, I don't know, had this totally allergic reaction to? Like, you know, if my husband broke out in a hive.Jennie NashYeah. So, circling back to the—the storyline of—you took this medication, you lost your ability to write in this way, you changed medications, presumably, you got it back. What did it feel like to get it back? Did you—do you remember that?Jennifer SeniorOh God, yes, it was glorious.Jennie NashReally?!Jennifer SeniorOh, you don't feel like yourself. I think that—I mean, I think there are many professions that are intertwined with identity. They may be the more professional—I'm sorry, the more creative professions. But not always, you know. And so if your writing voice is gone, and it's—I mean, so much of writing is an expression of your interior, if not life, then, I don't know some kind of thought process and something that you're working out. To have that drained out of you, for someone to just decant all the life out of your—or something to decant all the life out of your writing, it's—it's, I wouldn't say it's traumatic, that's totally overstating it, but it's—it's a huge bummer. It's, you know, it's depressing.Jennie NashWell, the word glorious, that's so cool. So to feel that you got back your—the you-ness of your voice was—was glorious. I mean, that's—that's amazing.Jennifer SeniorWhat—if I can just say, I wrote a feature, right, that then, like, I remember coming off of it, and then I wrote a feature that won the News Women's Club of New York story for best feature that year. Like, I didn't realize that those are kind of hard to win, and not like I won... I think I've won one since. But, like, that was in, like, 99 or something. I mean, like, you know, I don't write a whole lot of things that win stuff, until recently, you know. There was, like, a real kind of blackout period where, you know, I mean, but like—which I think, it probably didn't have to do with the quality of my writing. I mean, there was—but, I mean, you know, I wasn't writing any of the stuff that floated to the tippy top, and, like, I think that there was some kind of explosion thereof, like, all the, again, stuff that was just desperate to come out. I think there was just this volcanic outpouring.Jennie NashSo you're saying now you are winning things, which is indeed true. I mean, Pulitzer Prizes among them. Do you think that that has to do with this getting better? The wisdom, the practice, the glorious having of your abilities? Or, I guess what I'm asking is, like, is luck a part of—a part of all that? Is it just, it just happens? Or do you think there's some reason that it's happening? You feel that your writing is that powerful now?Jennifer SeniorWell, luck is definitely a part of it, because The Atlantic is the greatest place to showcase your feature writing. It gets so much attention, even though I think fewer people probably read that piece about Bobby McIlvaine than would have read any of my columns on any given day. The kind of attention was just so different. And it makes sense in a funny way, because it was 13,600 words or something. I mean, it was so long, and columns are 750 words. But, like, I think that I just lucked out in terms of the showcase. So that's definitely a part of it. And The Atlantic has the machinery to, you know, and all these dedicated, wonderful publicity people who will make it possible for people to read it, blah, blah, blah. So there's that. If you're older, you know everyone in the business, so you have people amplifying your work, they're suddenly reading it and saying, hey, everybody read it. It was before Twitter turned to garbage. Media was still a way to amplify it. It's much harder now, so passing things along through social media has become a real problem. But at that moment, it was not—Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorSo that was totally luck. Also, I wonder if it was because I was suddenly writing something from in the first person, and my voice was just better that way. And I wouldn't have had, like, the courage, you know?Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorAnd also, you're a book critic, which is what I was at The Times. And you certainly are not writing from the first person. And as a columnist, you're not either.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorSo, you know, those are very kind of constricted forms, and they're also not—there are certainly critics who win Pulitzers. I don't think I was good enough at it. I was good, but it was not good enough. I could name off the top of my head, like, so many critics who were—who are—who haven't even won anything yet. Like Dwight Garner really deserves one. Why has he not won a Pulitzer? He's, I think, the best writer—him and Sophie Gilbert, who keeps coming close. I don't get it, like, what the hell?Jennie NashDo you—as a—as a reader of other people's work, I know you—you mentioned Michael Ondaatje that you'd studied—study him. But do you just recognize when somebody else is on their game? Like, do you recognize the voice or the gloriousness of somebody else's work? Can you just be like, yeah, that...?Jennifer SeniorWell, Philip Roth, sentence for sentence. Martin Amis, even more so—I cannot get over the originality of each of his sentences and the wide vocabulary from which he recruits his words, and, like, maybe some of that is just being English. I think they just get better, kind of more comprehensive. They read more comprehensively. And I always tell people, if they want to improve their voice, they should read the Victorians, like that [unintelligible]. His also facility with metaphor, I don't think, is without equal. The thing is, I can't stand his fiction. I just find it repellent. But his criticism is bangers and his memoirs are great, so I love them.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorSo I really—I read him very attentively, trying to think of, like, other people whose kind of...Jennie NashI guess I was—I was getting at more... like, genius recognizes genius, that con... that concept, like, when you know you can do this and write in this way from time to time anyway, you can pull it off.Jennifer SeniorYeah, genius as in—I wouldn't—we can't go there.Jennie NashWell, that's the—that's the cliché, right? But, like...Jennifer SeniorOh no, I know, I know. Game—game, game recognizes game.Jennie NashGame recognizes game is a better way of saying it. Like, do you see—that's actually what the phrase is. I don't know where I came up with genius, but...Jennifer SeniorNo, it's fine. You can stick anything in that template, you know—evil recognizes evil, I mean, you know, it's like a...Jennie NashYeah. Do you see it? Do you see it? Like, you can see it in other people?Jennifer SeniorSure. Oh yeah, I see it.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorI mean, you're just talking about among my contemporaries, or just as it...Jennie NashJust like anything, like when you pick up a book or you read an article or even listen to a storytelling pack podcast, that sense of being in the hands of somebody who's on it.Jennifer SeniorYeah, I think that Jonathan Goldstein—I mean, I think that the—the Heavyweight Podcast, for sure, is something—and more than that, it's—it's storytelling structure, it's just that—I think that anybody who's a master at structure would just look at that show and be like, yeah, that show nails it each and every time.Jennie NashI've not listened, but I feel like I should end our time together. I would talk to you forever about this, but I always like to leave our listeners with something specific to reflect or practice or do. And is there anything related to metaphor or practicing, finding your voice, owning your voice, that you would suggest for—for folks? You've already suggested a lot.Jennifer SeniorRead the Victorians.Jennie NashAwesome. Any particular one that you would say start with?Jennifer SeniorYeah, you know what? I find Dickens rough sledding. I like his, you know, dear friend Wilkie Collins. I think No Name is one of the greatest books ever. I would read No Name.Jennie NashAmazing. And I will add, go read Jennifer's work. We'll link to a bunch of it in the show notes. Study her and—and watch what she does and learn what she does—that there it is, a master at work, and that's what I would suggest. So thank you for joining us and having this amazing discussion.Jennifer SeniorThis has been super fun.Jennie NashAnd for our listeners, until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

On this week's Book Club podcast I'm joined by debut author Leon Craig to talk about her novel The Decadence – a story of millennial debauchery in a haunted house which uses a knowing patchwork of literary influences from Boccaccio and Shirley Jackson to Martin Amis and Mark Z. Danielewski to make an old form fresh. She discusses how and why it took her so long to write, how she first acquired a taste for the gothic, and why she thinks the horror novel, that seeming relic of the 1970s, is making such a dramatic comeback. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Notes and Links to Kurt Baumeister's Work   Kurt Baumeister's writing has appeared in Salon, Guernica, Electric Literature, Rain Taxi, The Brooklyn Rail, The Rumpus, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, The Nervous Breakdown, The Weeklings, and other outlets. An acquisitions editor with 7.13 Books, Baumeister holds an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College, and is a member of The National Book Critics Circle and The Authors Guild. Twilight of the Gods is his second novel. Buy Twilight of the Gods   Kurt's Website   Chicago Review of Books Interview Re: Twilight of the Gods  At about 2:45, Kurt talks about the book's original publication date falling around the 2024 elections At about 6:15, Kurt reflects on the vagaries of publishing, and interesting and complimentary feedback from readers on the book At about 11:30, Pete shares a wonderful quote about Kurt's writing, and Kurt discusses Martin Amis and other influences on his writing At about 15:45, The two discuss the book's “Dramatis Personae” to start the book and some tongue-in-cheek descriptions of some Norse gods At about 17:30, Kurt responds to Pete's questions about Loki's historical and mythical evolutions At about 20:30, Kurt reflects on metafiction and gives background on why he names a main character in the book “Kurt” At about 23:50, Kurt talks about media representations of Loki in connection to his own At about 25:30, Kurt describes why he makes Loki as he is  At about 28:20, Kurt gives background on the Norns, of which Sunshine/Sabrina from the book is a member At about 29:30, Pete compliments the ways the book traces human history, particularly with regard to Hitler's rise  At about 34:15, Kurt responds to Pete's question about mixing fiction and fact At about 37:00, Kurt talks about history repeating itself and connecting disparate eras  At about 39:55, Kurt responds to Pete's question about the subtleties and the nuances of the book, i.e, plot focus v. allegory focus At about 42:00, Kurt discusses his mindset in writing the ending(s) of the book At about 45:00, An intriguing question posed in the book about fate is probed At about 45:50, Pete cites the book's ending as highly successful, and Kurt shouts out a shared beloved movie, Training Day, with regard to slowly-creeping evil  At about 47:50, a “reverence and pity” for artists is discussed, as mentioned in the book   You can now subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and leave me a five-star review. You can also ask for the podcast by name using Alexa, and find the pod on Stitcher, Spotify, and on Amazon Music. Follow Pete on IG, where he is @chillsatwillpodcast, or on Twitter, where he is @chillsatwillpo1. You can watch other episodes on YouTube-watch and subscribe to The Chills at Will Podcast Channel. Please subscribe to both the YouTube Channel and the podcast while you're checking out this episode.       Pete is very excited to have one or two podcast episodes per month featured on the website of Chicago Review of Books. The audio will be posted, along with a written interview culled from the audio. His conversation with Hannah Pittard, a recent guest, is up at Chicago Review.     Sign up now for The Chills at Will Podcast Patreon: it can be found at patreon.com/chillsatwillpodcastpeterriehl      Check out the page that describes the benefits of a Patreon membership, including cool swag and bonus episodes. Thanks in advance for supporting Pete's one-man show, DIY podcast and extensive reading, research, editing, and promoting to keep this independent podcast pumping out high-quality content! This month's Patreon bonus episode features an exploration of flawed characters, protagonists who are too real in their actions, and horror and noir as being where so much good and realistic writing takes place. Pete has added a $1 a month tier for “Well-Wishers” and Cheerleaders of the Show.     This is a passion project, a DIY operation, and Pete would love for your help in promoting what he's convinced is a unique and spirited look at an often-ignored art form.    The intro song for The Chills at Will Podcast is “Wind Down” (Instrumental Version), and the other song played on this episode was “Hoops” (Instrumental)” by Matt Weidauer, and both songs are used through ArchesAudio.com.     Please tune in for Episode 312 with Amber Sparks, the author of the short story collections And I Do Not Forgive You and The Unfinished World. Her writing has appeared in The Paris Review, Granta, Slate, and elsewhere. Her book, Happy People Don't Live Here, was published in October 2025. The episode drops on November 25, today. Please go to ceasefiretoday.org, and/or https://act.uscpr.org/a/letaidin to call your congresspeople and demand an end to the forced famine and destruction of Gaza and the Gazan people.

On this week's Book Club podcast I'm joined by debut author Leon Craig to talk about her novel The Decadence – a story of millennial debauchery in a haunted house which uses a knowing patchwork of literary influences from Boccaccio and Shirley Jackson to Martin Amis and Mark Z. Danielewski to make an old form fresh. She discusses how and why it took her so long to write, how she first acquired a taste for the gothic, and why she thinks the horror novel, that seeming relic of the 1970s, is making such a dramatic comeback.Become a Spectator subscriber today to access this podcast without adverts. Go to spectator.co.uk/adfree to find out more.For more Spectator podcasts, go to spectator.co.uk/podcastsContact us: podcast@spectator.co.uk Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dame Rose Tremain is one of Britain's most prolific and popular writers, having written 17 novels and five collections of short stories over the last 50 years. She was one of only six women on Granta magazine's inaugural 1982 list of the best young British novelists, alongside Martin Amis, Ian McEwan, Salman Rushdie and others. Her fifth novel Restoration was nominated for the Booker Prize in 1989, she won the Whitbread Prize for Music And Silence in 1999, and was awarded the 2008 Orange Prize - the precursor to the Women's Prize for Fiction - for her novel The Road Home. Having already been made a CBE in 2007, she became Dame Rose Tremain in 2020 for services to writing. Her most recent work is a short story called The Toy Car.Rose Tremain tells John Wilson how her father, a largely unsuccessful playwright called Keith Thomson, inspired her childhood interest in storytelling, although he never encouraged her to write. She recalls how she first started writing fiction to help her cope with loneliness in a household where there was little parental affection. Rose recalls how it was a teacher at her boarding school who first recognised her ability and encouraged her to apply for an Oxbridge university place, only to be dissuaded by her mother, who sent her to a finishing school in France instead. She credits the novelist Angus Wilson, one of her English Literature tutors at the University Of East Anglia, for giving her the confidence to write her first novel. She also chooses The Diary Of Samuel Pepys as a major inspiration on her 1989 Booker-shortlisted novel Restoration, which was later turned into a Hollywood film starring Robert Downey Jnr. and Meg Ryan.Producer: Edwina Pitman

I've anticipated this interview for 6 years. Robyn Davidson has lived one of the most mythologised lives in Australian memory.She famously and unintentionally burst onto the scene with Tracks in 1988, which was a 2,700km camel trek across the Simpson desert. She'd never intended to write a book or document anything of it's kind from the journey, but was desperate for some money to gather supplies for the impending trip. She figured $1000 would do, and serendipitously met the National Geographic photographer who put her on the map whilst cleaning windows as a part time gig in Alice Springs. He said that if she wrote to National Geographic telling them about the journey, then she might get what she needed.They paid her $4,000 which Robyn comments 'was a fortune', and from there, the rest is history.Robyn has since lived between India, London and Australia but travelled most elsewhere on the map. She was with Salman Rushdie while he wrote the 'Satanic Verses', has published a series of books and articles documenting the lives of nomads, lived an 'aristocratic life' with her partner Narendra Singh Bhati in the high Himalayas and most recently published an autobiography titled 'Unfinished Woman'. Robyn say's to me that 'memoir is the slipperiest genre'.I have waited 6 years to do this interview with Robyn. She has a dream guest of mine since before the podcast began. We recorded earlier this year in rural Victoria. The interview is Robyn's life. What led up to tracks, and what happened after. Robyn reflects on her lifelong resistance to labels. Not a “writer,” not a “traveller,” not a “feminist icon,” but simply, as she says, “a person.” We speak about memoir, the slipperiness of memory “in retrospect, memory is imagination”.She speaks candidly about solitude, beauty, and depression, her family, fame, about the distortion of the famous photographs “Rick made me look like a Vogue model, that wasn't me”, and her uneasy relationship with literary celebrity in London alongside Doris Lessing, Salman Rushdie, Christopher Hitchens, Martin Amis and more.“Whenever you write in the first person, you are necessarily creating a character — a doppelgänger. She is me, but she's not quite me.”“The truth is, memory is imagination.”“I worship the phrase ‘I don't know.' If you don't have ‘I don't know,' you can't learn anything.”“If you have a firm identity, you're trapped in it.”In this podcast you can expect the following discussion. The Performed Self & Identity“Whenever you use the first-person pronoun, you are necessarily creating a character.”The Narrative Fallacy“We invent neat, linear, emotionally satisfying stories to explain what happened… but the world is messy, chaotic and driven by chance.”Freedom, Nomadism & Refusal to Be FixedFreedom and movement — literal and intellectual — define her resistance to labels like “travel writer” or “author.”Chance, Fate & Serendipity“On the tiniest turning point you can head off in a billion directions.”Depression, Nihilism & Meaning“It's a terrible pain that hovers somewhere between the physical body and the mental body.”“To learn how to deal with a profoundly nihilistic view and to counter that view — that's been the most formative moment of my life.”Beauty, Objectification & Subjecthood“If that journey was about anything, it was about being the subject of my own life, not an object.”Feminism, Rebellion & the 1968 GenerationThe spirit of the late-'60s counterculture — radical freedom, equality, and experimentation — shaped her worldview.Authenticity vs. Fame“What I was interested in was knowledge and whether people were genuine or

Sir Ian McEwan is one of Britain's most acclaimed novelists, a Booker prize winner with a career spanning five decades with work that often explores morality, memory, and the intersections of private lives with public events. Sir Ian has long been associated with contemporaries like Martin Amis, Julian Barnes, and Salman Rushdie, who together reshaped the British novel from the 1980s onward. In this episode of Ways to Change the World, he spoke to Krishnan Guru-Murthy about the great issues facing the world from artificial intelligence to the rise of authoritarianism - as well as his latest novel What We Can Know.

This episode takes Jack Aldane to Manchester, where he meets two men who knew Martin Amis in a rather unique setting. Ian McGuire and John McAuliffe, both esteemed authors, are the co-founders of The Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester.Not long after establishing this bastion of new literary talent in 2007, the pair began the search for ambassadors to endorse its mission and teach new entrants. In 2006-2007, Martin Amis joined as Iconic Professor of Creative Writing. He was followed in 2011-2012 by Colm Tóibín, who in turn was followed by Jeanette Winterson, who has filled the role since 2013. More recently, the centre has enjoyed the employment of Emma Clarke and Tim Price on its new screenwriting modules. As its website explains, the centre teaches people "how to write novels, short stories, poems, plays and screenplays", helping students "to read as a writer reads, offer seminars on form and theory, and on contemporary publishing".Ian and John recount their fondest, funniest memories of working alongside Amis, as well as the political climate after 9/11 that made him more of a political figure than he'd ever been before.This conversation captures an altogether different look at who Amis was. This is Martin Amis not so much performing for an audience as seeking to impart the best of what he knew to a new generation of writers. This was, as John describes, an "avuncular" Amis, then in his 50s and early 60s, still game for a pint down the local with his students, and with arguably some of his best work still ahead.And then there was Amis's surprising grasp of the 5 principles of Pilates. If you want understand what that's about, you know what to do.FOLLOW US ON TWITTER/ X: @mymartinamisFIND US ON YOUTUBE Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Seduction Theory by Emily Adrian isn't your average campus novel. Emily joins us to talk about writing comedy, marriage plots, reading classics and more. The Hypocrite by Jo Hamya is a gripping tale of complex family mythologies. Jo joins us to talk about writing dialogue, literary influences, story structure, separating art from the artist, characterization and more. Listen in as these authors speak separately with Miwa Messer, host of Poured Over. This episode of Poured Over was hosted by Executive Producer Miwa Messer and mixed by Harry Liang.        Featured Books (Episode): Seduction Theory by Emily Adrian Vladimir by Julia May Jonas The Wife by Meg Wolitzer The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden The Bostonians by Henry James The Hypocrite by Jo Hamya Three Rooms by Jo Hamya The Pregnant Widow by Martin Amis

Every Wednesday and Friday in August we will publish some of our favourite audio long reads of 2025, in case you missed them, with an introduction from the editorial team to explain why we've chosen it. This week, from March: over 50 years, she has become one of the most revered writers in Australia. Is she finally going to get worldwide recognition? By Sophie Elmhirst. Read by Nicolette Chin. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/longreadpod

"The writer has to have patience, the perseverance to just sit there alone and grind it out. And if that's not worth doing," Leonard said, "then he doesn't want to write." Leonard wanted to write from a young age, and write he did, first producing western stories and western novels before moving toward the crime novels that made his reputation. His is the career of a working writer the likes we don't see much of anymore. About COOLER THAN COOL, Pulitzer Prize winner Dave Barry writes that "If you love Elmore Leonard-and who doesn't?-you'll love this fascinating, richly detailed account of how one of our greatest storytellers lived his life and learned his craft."Over the course of his sixty-year career, Elmore Leonard published forty-five novels that had enduring appeal to readers around the world. Revered by other writers such as Martin Amis, Margaret Atwood, Raymond Carver, and Stephen King, his books were innovative in their blending of a Hemingway-inspired noirish minimalism and masterful use of dialogue over exposition-a direct evolution spurred by his years as a screenwriter.When C. M. Kushins was fifteen he worked up his courage and wrote a fan letter to Elmore and included one of his own short stories. Elmore proofread it and wrote an encouraging letter back. Years later, Kushins finally got a short story published and Elmore sent him a congratulatory note. When he first started thinking about writing this book, Kushins went nosing around the University of South Carolina archives-and found his own letters going back to when he was fifteen. Elmore had saved all their correspondence. It was this story that helped him get the Leonard family on board with the book. Indeed, the Leonard family has fully participated, contributing original interviews, additional personal correspondence, exclusive photographs, as well as access to Leonard's unfinished final novel. The biography also includes unpublished, loose memoir excerpts. These are included here for the first time to illuminate key passages of importance throughout Leonard's life in his own words.Leonard's fiction contained many layers, and at the heart of his work were progressive themes, stemming from his years as a student of the Jesuit religious order, his personal beliefs in social justice, and his successful battle over alcoholism. He drew inspiration from greats like Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, but the true motivation and brilliance behind his crime writing was the ongoing class struggle to achieve the American Dream-often seen through the eyes of law enforcement officers and the criminals they vowed to apprehend.COOLER THAN COOL is not just a biography for fans of Leonard's fiction. His is work was also the source material for many movies including 3:10 to Yuma, Hombre, Jackie Brown, Get Shorty, Out of Sight-as well as the TV series Justified-and influenced American filmmaking, especially the western and crime genres.Definitive and revealing, COOLER THAN COOL shows Leonard emerging as one of the last writers of the "pulp fiction" era of midcentury America, to ultimately become one of the most successful storytellers of the twentieth century, whose influence continues to have far-reaching effects on both contemporary crime fiction and American filmmaking.One more thing: 2025 also marks Elmore Leonard's centennial. In September, Mariner Books will bring a never-published novella by the author, Picket Line, with an introduction by Kushins, timed to Leonard's October birthday.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/arroe-collins-unplugged-totally-uncut--994165/support.

En este segundo episodio del especial sobre los años 80, Ricardo y Alejandro se adentran en la década desde su faceta más vibrante: la música, el cine, la literatura y la cultura popular.Fue la era dorada del videoclip, con Michael Jackson marcando un antes y un después, mientras Madonna, Prince y Whitney Houston definían el sonido y la estética pop de la época. En Colombia la hegemonía cultural gringa convivía, y a veces competía, con lo local: el vallenato vivía su propio auge con Diomedes Díaz y el Binomio de Oro.En el cine, E.T., Blade Runner o The Breakfast Club se convirtieron en símbolos, mientras en Colombia títulos como El embajador de la India o las comedias del Gordo Benjumea, como El taxista millonario, conectaban con el público. La literatura tuvo nombres que marcaron época, desde García Márquez y Vallejo hasta Tom Wolfe, Martin Amis, Don DeLillo, Raymond Carver, Richard Ford, Paul Auster y Stephen King.Fue también la década en que los videojuegos llegaron para quedarse, con Space Invaders, Pac-Man y las máquinas de arcade en lugares como Unicentro en Bogotá.Consigue El arte de no enloquecer aquí: https://www.librerianacional.com/el-arte-de-no-enloquecer/p?srsltid=AfmBOoosXMUOGj46ViZSS16nyw97thP2kVFEEHdkmVCjqc1Ml2A3Je75. Toma Ficcionario, el audiotaller de escritura con Ricardo Silva Romero: https://ellocutorio.com/ficcionario

Sam Leith's guest on this week's Book Club podcast is Nicola Barker, talking about her new book TonyInterruptor -- about how a man who interrupts a free jazz concert becomes a viral sensation on social media. Nicola tells Sam why some of her books are bouts of the flu and some are sneezes, how hard she works on her apparently spontaneous prose, why she remains devoted to reality television — and about the time she went to visit Martin Amis with a ghetto blaster.    

Sam Leith's guest on this week's Book Club podcast is Nicola Barker, talking about her new book TonyInterruptor -- about how a man who interrupts a free jazz concert becomes a viral sensation on social media. Nicola tells Sam why some of her books are bouts of the flu and some are sneezes, how hard she works on her apparently spontaneous prose, why she remains devoted to reality television — and about the time she went to visit Martin Amis with a ghetto blaster.    Become a Spectator subscriber today to access this podcast without adverts. Go to spectator.co.uk/adfree to find out more.For more Spectator podcasts, go to spectator.co.uk/podcastsContact us: podcast@spectator.co.uk

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comTom is a novelist, essayist, and critic, who once described himself as a “supposed literary intellectual/homosexual/Republican.” He's the former literary editor of GQ and a professor emeritus of English at GW. He's the author of 11 books of fiction, including Up With the Sun, Dewey Defeats Truman, and Fellow Travelers — which was adapted into a miniseries. His nonfiction has focused on plagiarism (Stolen Words), letters (Yours Ever), and the Kennedy assassination (Mrs. Paine's Garage). His new book is The Very Heart of It: New York Diaries, 1983-1994.For two clips of our convo — on the “mixed marriages” of the AIDS crisis, and Hitchens before cancel culture — head to our YouTube page.Other topics: his struggling middle-class family on Long Island; his dad a WWII vet; neither parent finished high school — and Tom went to Harvard for his PhD; the Space Race; when you could make a good living as a freelance writer; novelist Mary McCarthy as a formative influence; Capote; Vidal; Mailer; Updike; Orwell and clarity in writing; the Danish cartoonists; the Jacob Epstein plagiarism scandal; Martin Amis; Elizabeth Hardwick; Tom's conservatism; the New Deal as a buffer against socialism; the anti-Communism of Catholics; Bobby Kennedy; leftist utopianism on campus; Bill Buckley; AIDS bringing America out of the closet; losing a boyfriend to the disease; the fear of an HIV test; the medieval symptoms; the deadly perils of dating; the dark humor; writing Virtually Normal thinking I would die; the miracle drugs; survivor's guilt; advocating for gay marriage; its relatively quick acceptance; and Tom's husband of 36 years who's had HIV for more than three decades.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Tara Zahra on the revolt against globalization after WWI, trans activist Shannon Minter debating trans issues, Scott Anderson on the Iranian Revolution, and Johann Hari turning the tables to interview me. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Ross Barkan is a 35 year-old American journalist and novelist from Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. His third novel, Glass Century, was published on 6 May 2025.On a semi-vacation to London this summer, Ross and Jack met to speak about Ross's favourite Martin Amis novel, Inside Story.This the first episode of the series to deal explicitly, and at length, with Donald Trump.Looking beyond the playful concept of 'The Maggot Probability' (first coined by Kingsley Amis to explain the degenerative effects of an ageing brain), Ross and Jack discuss Amis's graver concerns about true impact of America's septuagenarian president on its politics and political culture.As a New Yorker, Ross recognises what he calls Trump's "outer-borough mindset", an attitude of adversity towards the elites of Manhattan who famously paid Trump little serious attention before his meteoric rise to office in 2016 forced them to.That mindset, he argues, became Trump's calling card to the left behind of America, for whom Washington had come to represent the same den of iniquity and aloofness that the gleaming towers of The Big Apple had to Trump in the 70s and 80s.And yet, while Amis does not take Trump lightly, Ross says his criticisms of Trump lack the corrosive power of the pen that Amis was otherwise known for. Amis confesses to taking an arch tone on the subject in Inside Story, though says he does so only because Trump is a "sick joke".It's suggested later in the conversation that while Amis excelled at diagnosing modern pathologies in characters like John Self, he may have bottled it when it came to confronting the real thing in Trump. Does it take a true New Yorker to satirise this century's most controversial Western leader? It may help to read Ross's new novel before answering.Finally, listen to this episode to discover what Ross took as indispensable writing advice from Amis in Inside Story.FOLLOW US ON TWITTER/ X: @mymartinamisFIND US ON YOUTUBE Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to assorted local theater & book venues   Colm Toibin: “Long Island,” sequel to “Brooklyn” Colm Tóibín discusses his latest novel, “Long Island,” which follows characters from his earlier best-seller, “Brooklyn” twenty years later. Hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Colm Tóibín was born in Enniscorthy, Ireland, in 1955. He is the author of 11 novels including The Master, Brooklyn, The Testament of Mary, Nora Webster, House of Names and The Magician. His work has been shortlisted for The Booker Prize three times, has won the Costa Novel Award and the IMPAC Award. He has also published two collections of stories and many works of non-fiction. Special thanks to the folks at BookShop West Portal in San Francisco for their assistance. Complete Interview.   Martin Amis: “The Zone of Interest” Martin Amis (1949-2023), in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded in the KPFA studio on a book tour for “The Zone of Interest,” October 29, 2014 Novelist and essayist Martin Amis died of cancer on May 19, 2023 at the age of 73, leaving behind such novels as The Rachel Papers, London Fields, The Information, and his last memoir-cum-novel, Inside Story. On October 29th, 2014, Richard Wolinsky conducted the last of five interviews with Martin Amis, about Amis's then most recent novel, The Zone of Interest. A new film adaptation of that novel recently opened to rave reviews. Complete Interview   Review of “& Juliet” at BroadwaySF Orpheum through July 27, 2025.   Book Interview/Events and Theatre Links Note: Shows may unexpectedly close early or be postponed due to actors' positive COVID tests. Check the venue for closures, ticket refunds, and mask requirements before arrival. Dates are in-theater performances unless otherwise noted. Some venues operate Tuesday – Sunday; others for shorter periods each week. All times Pacific Time. Closing dates are sometimes extended. Book Stores Bay Area Book Festival  See website for highlights from the 110th Annual Bay Area Book Festival, May 31 – June 1, 2025. Book Passage.  Monthly Calendar. Mix of on-line and in-store events. Books Inc.  Mix of on-line and in-store events. The Booksmith.  Monthly Event Calendar. BookShop West Portal. Monthly Event Calendar. Center for Literary Arts, San Jose. See website for Book Club guests in upcoming months. Green Apple Books. Events calendar. Kepler's Books  On-line Refresh the Page program listings. Live Theater Companies Actors Ensemble of Berkeley.  Summers at John Hinkel Park: Cymbeline opens July 4; The Taming of the Shrew opens August 16. See website for readings and events. Actor's Reading Collective (ARC).  All readings at 7 pm: The Thin Place by Lucas Hnath, July 13 Aurora; Appropriate by Brandon Jacob Jenkins, July 20 Aurora, July 21  Z Below. The Best We Could by Emily Feldman, July 27 Aurora, July 28 Z Below; Recipe by Michael Gene Sullivan, August 4 Aurora; August 5 The Magic. African American Art & Culture Complex. See website for calendar. Afro-Solo Theatre Company.See website for calendar. American Conservatory Theatre Young Conservatory: Hadestown, Teen Edition, August 8-17, Strand. Kim's Convenience by Ins Choi, Sept 18 – Oct 19, Toni Rembe Theatre. Aurora Theatre  The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe by Jane Wagner, with Marga Gomez, July 12 – August 10.  Awesome Theatre Company. See website for information. Berkeley Rep. The Reservoir .by Jake Brasch, Sept. 5 – Oct 12, Peets Theatre. See website for summer events. Berkeley Shakespeare Company See website for upcoming events and productions. Boxcar Theatre. The Illusionist with Kevin Blake, live at the Palace Theatre. Tony Brava Theatre Center: See calendar for events listings. The Heat Will Kill Everything written and performed by Keith Josef Adkins, July 17-19. BroadwaySF: & Juliet, July 1-27, Orpheum. See website for complete listings for the Orpheum, Golden Gate and Curran Theaters. Broadway San Jose:  Moulin Rouge!, The Musical. July 8-13. See website for other events. Center Rep: Indecent by Paula Vogel, September 1 – 28. Lesher Center. Central Stage. See website for upcoming productions, 5221 Central Avenue, Richmond Central Works  The Last Goat by Gary Graves, June 28 – July 27. Cinnabar Theatre. Sherwood: The Adventures of Robin Hood by Ken Ludwig, September  12-28, Sonoma State. Club Fugazi. Dear San Francisco ongoing. Check website for Music Mondays listings. Contra Costa Civic Theatre Pippin, August 30 – Sept. 14. See website for other events. Golden Thread   The Return by Hanna Eady and Edward Mast, August 7 – 24, The Garret at ACT's Toni Rembe Theatre. Hillbarn Theatre: Murder for Two, a musical comedy, October 9 – November 2, 2025. Lorraine Hansberry Theatre. See website for specific workshops and events. Los Altos Stage Company. Guys & Dolls, July 18 – 27, Los Altos Youth Theatre. Lower Bottom Playaz  August Wilson's Two Trains Running, August 8 -31. August Wilson's King Hedley II, November 8 -30. BAM House, Oakland. Magic Theatre. Aztlan by Luis Alfaro, World Premiere, June 25 – July 20 (extended). See website for additional events. Marin Shakespeare Company: A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare, June 13 – July 13, Forest Meadows Amphitheatre. See website for other events. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts Upcoming Events Page. New Conservatory Theatre Center (NCTC)  Ride the Cyclone, the musical, July 11 – August 15. New Performance Traditions.  See website for upcoming schedule Oakland Theater Project. Les Blancs (The Whites) by Lorraine Hansberry, July 11 – 27. Odd Salon: Upcoming events in San Francisco & New York, and streaming. Palace of Fine Arts Theater.  See website for event listings. Pear Theater. Constellations by Nick Payne, June 27 – July 20. See website for staged readings and other events. Playful People Productions. See web page for information on upcoming shows. Presidio Theatre. See website for complete schedule of events and performances. Ray of Light: 9 to 5, the Musical. September 2025. Ross Valley Players: See website for New Works Sunday night readings and other events. San Francisco Playhouse. My Fair Lady, July 3 – Sept. 13. SFBATCO.  See website for upcoming streaming and in- theater shows.  The Day The Sky Turned Orange by Julius Ernesto, Sept 5 – Oct. 5, Z Space. San Jose Stage Company: See website for events and upcoming season Shotgun Players.  The Magnolia Ballet by Terry Guest, July 12 – August 10. South Bay Musical Theatre:  The Sound of Music, September 27 – October 18. Stagebridge: See website for events and productions. Storytime every 4th Saturday. The Breath Project. Streaming archive. The Marsh: Calendar listings for Berkeley, San Francisco and Marshstream. Theatre Lunatico See website for upcoming events and producctions. Theatre Rhino  Kyles' by Olivia Bratco, July 3-18.Streaming: Essential Services Project, conceived and performed by John Fisher, all weekly performances now available on demand. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. Come Back to the 5 & Dime, Jimmy Dean  Jimmy Dean, A New Musical, June  18 – July 13. Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts. Word for Word.  See website for upcoming productions. Misc. Listings: BAMPFA: On View calendar for Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. Berkeley Symphony: See website for listings. Chamber Music San Francisco: Calendar, 2025 Season. Dance Mission Theatre. On stage events calendar. Fort Mason Center. Events calendar. Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Calendar listings and upcoming shows. San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus. See schedule for upcoming SFGMC performances. San Francisco Opera. Calendar listings. San Francisco Symphony. Calendar listings. Filmed Live Musicals: Searchable database of all filmed live musicals, podcast, blog. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theater venue to this list, please write Richard@kpfa.org                                   .   . The post July 10, 2025: Colm Toibin – Martin Amis appeared first on KPFA.

"The writer has to have patience, the perseverance to just sit there alone and grind it out. And if that's not worth doing," Leonard said, "then he doesn't want to write." Leonard wanted to write from a young age, and write he did, first producing western stories and western novels before moving toward the crime novels that made his reputation. His is the career of a working writer the likes we don't see much of anymore. About COOLER THAN COOL, Pulitzer Prize winner Dave Barry writes that "If you love Elmore Leonard-and who doesn't?-you'll love this fascinating, richly detailed account of how one of our greatest storytellers lived his life and learned his craft."Over the course of his sixty-year career, Elmore Leonard published forty-five novels that had enduring appeal to readers around the world. Revered by other writers such as Martin Amis, Margaret Atwood, Raymond Carver, and Stephen King, his books were innovative in their blending of a Hemingway-inspired noirish minimalism and masterful use of dialogue over exposition-a direct evolution spurred by his years as a screenwriter.When C. M. Kushins was fifteen he worked up his courage and wrote a fan letter to Elmore and included one of his own short stories. Elmore proofread it and wrote an encouraging letter back. Years later, Kushins finally got a short story published and Elmore sent him a congratulatory note. When he first started thinking about writing this book, Kushins went nosing around the University of South Carolina archives-and found his own letters going back to when he was fifteen. Elmore had saved all their correspondence. It was this story that helped him get the Leonard family on board with the book. Indeed, the Leonard family has fully participated, contributing original interviews, additional personal correspondence, exclusive photographs, as well as access to Leonard's unfinished final novel. The biography also includes unpublished, loose memoir excerpts. These are included here for the first time to illuminate key passages of importance throughout Leonard's life in his own words.Leonard's fiction contained many layers, and at the heart of his work were progressive themes, stemming from his years as a student of the Jesuit religious order, his personal beliefs in social justice, and his successful battle over alcoholism. He drew inspiration from greats like Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, but the true motivation and brilliance behind his crime writing was the ongoing class struggle to achieve the American Dream-often seen through the eyes of law enforcement officers and the criminals they vowed to apprehend.COOLER THAN COOL is not just a biography for fans of Leonard's fiction. His is work was also the source material for many movies including 3:10 to Yuma, Hombre, Jackie Brown, Get Shorty, Out of Sight-as well as the TV series Justified-and influenced American filmmaking, especially the western and crime genres.Definitive and revealing, COOLER THAN COOL shows Leonard emerging as one of the last writers of the "pulp fiction" era of midcentury America, to ultimately become one of the most successful storytellers of the twentieth century, whose influence continues to have far-reaching effects on both contemporary crime fiction and American filmmaking.One more thing: 2025 also marks Elmore Leonard's centennial. In September, Mariner Books will bring a never-published novella by the author, Picket Line, with an introduction by Kushins, timed to Leonard's October birthday.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/arroe-collins-like-it-s-live--4113802/support.

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to assorted local theater & book venues   William Finn (1951-2025) and James Lapine William Finn, Richard Wolinsky and James Lapine Composer/lyricist William Finn, who died on April 7th, 2025 at the age of 73 and director/librettist James Lapine, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded March 20, 2019 at the Golden Gate Theater in San Francisco. William Finn is best known for writing the music and lyrics for two Broadway shows, Falsettos, which was the first gay-themed Broadway musical, and The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, which has become a staple of community theatre companies around the world. He also wrote A New Brain, which dealt with his near death experience following brain surgery.  Falsettos was originally three one-act musicals which opened off-Broadway, In Trousers, March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland and the latter two became Falsettos, which opened on Broadway in 1992, co-authored and directed by James Lapine, who'd also co-authored Falsettoland. James Lapine is best known for his work with Stephen Sondheim on Sunday in the Park with George and Into the Woods. Falsettos was revived on Broadway in 2016 and came to San Francisco in spring of 2019. Richard Wolinsnky had a chance to sit down with both William Finn and James Lapine on March 20, 2019 in the lobby of the Golden Gate Theatre to discuss Falsettos, as well as take a brief look at each man's career.   Martin Amis (1949-2023): The Zone of Interest Martin Amis (1949-2023), in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded in the KPFA studio on a book tour for “The Zone of Interest,” October 29, 2014. The Zone of Interest focuses on the lives of people who ran the concentration camps, as they chose to avoid thinking about their crimes against humanity. A film adaptation received Oscar nominations a couple of years ago. Novelist and essayist Martin Amis died of cancer on May 19, 2023 at the age of 73, leaving behind such novels as The Rachel Papers, London Fields, The Information, and his last memoir-cum-novel, Inside Story. On October 29th, 2014, Richard Wolinsky conducted the last of five interviews with Martin Amis, about Amis's then most recent novel, The Zone of Interest.   Review of “Here There Are Blueberries” at Berkeley Rep Roda Theatre through May 11, 2025.   Book Interview/Events and Theatre Links Note: Shows may unexpectedly close early or be postponed due to actors' positive COVID tests. Check the venue for closures, ticket refunds, and vaccination and mask requirements before arrival. Dates are in-theater performances unless otherwise noted. Some venues operate Tuesday – Sunday; others Wednesday or Thursday through Sunday. All times Pacific Time. Closing dates are sometimes extended. Book Stores Bay Area Book Festival  See website for highlights from the 10th Annual Bay Area Book Festival, June 1-2, 2024. Book Passage.  Monthly Calendar. Mix of on-line and in-store events. Books Inc.  Mix of on-line and in-store events. The Booksmith.  Monthly Event Calendar. BookShop West Portal. Monthly Event Calendar. Center for Literary Arts, San Jose. See website for Book Club guests in upcoming months. Green Apple Books. Events calendar. Kepler's Books  On-line Refresh the Page program listings. Live Theater Companies Actors Ensemble of Berkeley.  Summers at John Hinkel Park: Cymbeline opens July 4; The Taming of the Shrew opens August 16. See website for readings and events. Actor's Reading Collective (ARC).   See website for upcoming productions. African American Art & Culture Complex. See website for calendar. Afro-Solo Theatre Company.See website for calendar. American Conservatory Theatre Eddie Izzard Hamlet, April 1-20 Strand. Two Trains Running by August Wilson, April 15 -May 4, and The Comedy of Errors, April 22 – May 3 with The Acting Company, in repertory, Toni Rembe Theater. Aurora Theatre  Crumbs from the Table of Joy by Lynn Nottage, April 26-May 25, 2025 Awesome Theatre Company. See website for information. Berkeley Rep. Here There Are Blueberries by Moises Kaufman and Amanda Gronich, April 5 – May 11, Roda Theatre. Berkeley Shakespeare Company Julius Caesar, June 13-21, Live Oak Theater, Berkeley. y. See website for upcoming events and productions. Boxcar Theatre. The Illusionist with Kevin Blake, live at the Palace Theatre, through April 27. Brava Theatre Center: See calendar for current and upcoming productions. BroadwaySF: Six, April 8-20, Curran; Mamma Mia! April 30 – May 11, Orpheum. See website for complete listings for the Orpheum, Golden Gate and Curran Theaters. Broadway San Jose:  Six. April 22-27. See website for other events. Center Rep: The Roommate by Jen Silverman, March 30 – April 20. Lesher Center. Central Stage. See website for upcoming productions, 5221 Central Avenue, Richmond Central Works  The Last Goat by Gary Graves, June 28 – July 27. Cinnabar Theatre. Bright Star, June 13-29, Sonoma State. Club Fugazi. Dear San Francisco ongoing. Check website for Music Mondays listings. Contra Costa Civic Theatre Fiddler on the Roof June 7 – 22. See website for other events. 42nd Street Moon. See website for upcoming productions. Golden Thread  AZAD (The Rabbit and the Wolf) by Sona Tatoyan in collaboration with Jared Mezzocchi, April 11 – May 3. See website for other events. Hillbarn Theatre: Writing Fragments Home by Jeffrey Lo, April 17 – May 4. Lorraine Hansberry Theatre. Come Thru: A Celebration of Black Artistry, Story Telling and Community, May 5-18, Magic Theatre, Fort Mason. See website for specific workshops and events. Los Altos Stage Company. Cyrano by Edmund Rostand, April 10 – May 4. Lower Bottom Playaz  See website for upcoming productions. Magic Theatre. the boiling by Sunui Chang  April 3 -20, 2025. See website for additional events. Marin Shakespeare Company: See website for calendar. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts Upcoming Events Page. New Conservatory Theatre Center (NCTC) Simple Mexican Pleasures by Eric Reyes Loo, April 18 – May 11. New Performance Traditions.  See website for upcoming schedule Oakland Theater Project.  I Am My Own Wife by Doug Wright, March 21 – April 13, Odd Salon: Upcoming events in San Francisco & New York, and streaming. Palace of Fine Arts Theater.  See website for event listings. Pear Theater. Henry V by William Shakespeare, April 18 – May 11. See website for staged readings and other events. Playful People Productions. Disney's Frozen Jr., May 16-25, Hoover Theater, San Jose. Presidio Theatre. See website for complete schedule of events and performances. Ray of Light: Next to Normal. May 30 – June 21. Ross Valley Players: The Book of Will  by Lauren Gunderson, May 9 – June 8. See website for New Works Sunday night readings and other events. San Francisco Playhouse. Fat Ham by James Ijames, March 20 – April 19. SFBATCO.  See website for upcoming streaming and in- theater shows.  The Day The Sky Turned Orange by Julius Ernesto, Sept 5 – Oct. 5, Z Space. San Jose Stage Company: The Underpants by Steve Martin, April 3 -27. Shotgun Players.  Yellowface by David Henry Hwang, May 10 – June 8. South Bay Musical Theatre:  Brigadoon, May 17-June 7, Stagebridge: See website for events and productions. Storytime every 4th Saturday. The Breath Project. Streaming archive. The Marsh: Calendar listings for Berkeley, San Francisco and Marshstream. Theatre Lunatico  Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, April 26 – May 18. LaVal's Subterranean Theatre. Theatre Rhino  Gumiho by Nina Ki, April 17 – May 11. Streaming: Essential Services Project, conceived and performed by John Fisher, all weekly performances now available on demand. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. The Heart-Sellers by Lloyd Suh, April 2-27. Word for Word.  See website for upcoming productions. Misc. Listings: BAM/PFA: On View calendar for Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive. Berkeley Symphony: See website for listings. Chamber Music San Francisco: Calendar, 2025 Season. Dance Mission Theatre. On stage events calendar. Fort Mason Center. Events calendar. Crushing, live monologue show, Feb. 27-28. Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Calendar listings and upcoming shows. San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus. See schedule for upcoming SFGMC performances. San Francisco Opera. Calendar listings. San Francisco Symphony. Calendar listings. Filmed Live Musicals: Searchable database of all filmed live musicals, podcast, blog. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theater venue to this list, please write Richard@kpfa.org                                   .   . The post April 17, 2025: William Finn & James Lapine: Masters of the Musical appeared first on KPFA.

On Sunday 23 March 2025, listeners of the podcast gathered in Central London to watch a live Amisathon, featuring 8 panellists and the show's host.The panel included former guests as well as a couple of new faces: Leo Robson, Alys Denby, Finn McRedmond, James Marriott, Zoe Strimpel, Sam Leith, Vincenzo Barney and John Niven.It was a great success. Thank you to the 90+ ticket-holders who attended, to our wonderful panel, and to the stage team at 21Soho.Relive the event or listen for the first time in this episode, ripped straight from the boards of the stage at the venue.FOLLOW US ON TWITTER/ X: @mymartinamis Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Over 50 years, she has become one of the most revered writers in Australia. Is she finally going to get worldwide recognition? By Sophie Elmhirst. Read by Nicolette Chin. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/longreadpod

Welcome to the 92nd Episode of the ABC Pod the Adult Book Club where we drink and we read things. This episodefeatures Night Train by Martin Amis. Discussion of the book starts at the 11th minute. Spoilers are between the 41 and 1:01 minute marks. We go in depth about how learning this book was meant as a parody after the fact, changed how we viewed it. In spoilers, and before, we go off the rails quite a few times with tangents and trying to remember different actor's names, but always steer it back to the book. We finish with our usual segments and a surprise read for next episode. Enjoy! 

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky. Links to assorted local theater & book venues   Anthony Lewis on the First Amendment Anthony Lewis (1927-2013) discussing “Freedom for the Thought that We Hate: A Biography of the First Amendment,” with host Richard Wolinsky, recorded February 4, 2008 in the KPFA studios. In his long career, Anthony Lewis spent time as the Washington Bureau chief of the New York Times, was the author of “Gideon's Trumpet,” about a Supreme Court case that led to free legal counsel for indigent defendants, and spent several years as an op-ed writer for the Times. He won two Pulitzer Prizes for reportage, and wrote five books alone and two books with a co-author. In this segment from a longer interview, he delves into the history of the First Amendment, and freedom of speech in the United States.   Martin Amis (1949-2021) Martin Amis (1949-2023), in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded in the KPFA studio on a book tour for “Lionel Asbo, State of England,” September 20, 2012. Novelist and essayist Martin Amis died of cancer on May 19, 2023 at the age of 73, leaving behind such novels as The Rachel Papers, London Fields, The Information, and his last memoir-cum-novel, Inside Story. On September 20, 2012, Richard Wolinsky conducted the fourth of five interviews with Martin Amis, discussing this satire about the nature of celebrity and celebrity culture. Complete Interview.     Review of “Art” at Shotgun Players Ashby Stage through April 12, 2025. Review of “Nobody Loves You” at ACT Toni Rembe Theatre through March 30, 2025.   Book Interview/Events and Theatre Links Note: Shows may unexpectedly close early or be postponed due to actors' positive COVID tests. Check the venue for closures, ticket refunds, and vaccination and mask requirements before arrival. Dates are in-theater performances unless otherwise noted. Some venues operate Tuesday – Sunday; others Wednesday or Thursday through Sunday. All times Pacific Time. Closing dates are sometimes extended. Book Stores Bay Area Book Festival  See website for highlights from the 10th Annual Bay Area Book Festival, June 1-2, 2024. Book Passage.  Monthly Calendar. Mix of on-line and in-store events. Books Inc.  Mix of on-line and in-store events. The Booksmith.  Monthly Event Calendar. BookShop West Portal. Monthly Event Calendar. Center for Literary Arts, San Jose. See website for Book Club guests in upcoming months. Green Apple Books. Events calendar. Kepler's Books  On-line Refresh the Page program listings. Live Theater Companies Actors Ensemble of Berkeley.  Summers at John Hinkel Park: Cymbeline opens July 4; The Taming of the Shrew opens August 16. See website for readings and events. Actor's Reading Collective (ARC).   See website for upcoming productions. African American Art & Culture Complex. See website for calendar. Afro-Solo Theatre Company. Arts Festival 31: Let Freedom Ring, March 28-30, Potrero Stage. American Conservatory Theatre Nobody Loves You, a musical, Feb. 28 – March 30, Toni Rembe Theatre. Aurora Theatre  Crumbs from the Table of Joy by Lynn Nottage, April 26-May 25, 2025 Awesome Theatre Company. See website for information. Berkeley Rep. Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekhov, adapted by Conor McPherson, February 14 – March 23, Peets Theatre. Here There Are Blueberries by Moises Kaufman and Amanda Gronich, April 5 – May 11, Roda Theatre. Berkeley Shakespeare Company. See website for upcoming shows. Supergalza: A Shakespeare Cabaret, spring 2025. Boxcar Theatre. The Illusionist with Kevin Blake, live at the Palace Theatre, through April 27. Brava Theatre Center: See calendar for current and upcoming productions. BroadwaySF: Six, April 8-20, Curran; Mamma Mia! April 30 – May 11, Orpheum. See website for complete listings for the Orpheum, Golden Gate and Curran Theaters. Broadway San Jose:  The Cher Show. March 18 – 23. Center Rep: The Roommate by Jen Silverman, March 30 – April 20. Lesher Center. Central Stage. See website for upcoming productions, 5221 Central Avenue, Richmond Central Works  Push/Pull by Harry Davis, March 1 – 30, 2025. Cinnabar Theatre. Young Rep: Hamlet, March 15-23, Petaluma SRJC; Bright Star, June 13-29, Sonoma State. Club Fugazi. Dear San Francisco ongoing. Check website for Music Mondays listings. Contra Costa Civic Theatre Fiddler on the Roof June 7 – 22. See website for other events. 42nd Street Moon. See website for upcoming productions. Golden Thread  AZAD (The Rabbit and the Wolf) by Sona Tatoyan in collaboration with Jared Mezzocchi, April 11 – May 3. See website for other events. Hillbarn Theatre: Fly by Night conceived by Kim Rosenstock Written by Will Connolly, Michael Mitnick, and Kim Rosenstock, March 6 – 23. Lorraine Hansberry Theatre. See website for upcoming productions. Los Altos Stage Company. Cyrano by Edmund Rostand, April 10 – May 4. Lower Bottom Playaz  See website for upcoming productions. Magic Theatre. the boiling by Sunui Chang  April 3 -20, 2025. See website for additional events. Marin Shakespeare Company: See website for calendar. Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts Upcoming Events Page. New Conservatory Theatre Center (NCTC) Wild with Happy by Colman Domingo, March 7 – April 6. New Performance Traditions.  See website for upcoming schedule Oakland Theater Project.  I Am My Own Wife by Doug Wright, March 21 – April 6, Odd Salon: Upcoming events in San Francisco & New York, and streaming. Palace of Fine Arts Theater.  See website for event listings. Pear Theater. Penelope, a one-woman show written and performed by Ellen McLaughlin, March 27-30. Henry V by William Shakespeare, April 18 – May 11. See website for staged readings and other events. Playful People Productions. Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, April 10-19. Presidio Theatre. See website for complete schedule of events and performances. Ray of Light: Next to Normal. May 30 – June 21. Ross Valley Players: Pet Lingerie, a new musical, March 21- April 6. See website for New Works Sunday night readings and other events. San Francisco Playhouse. Fat Ham by James Ijames, March 20 – April 19. SFBATCO.  See website for upcoming streaming and in- theater shows. San Jose Stage Company: The Underpants by Steve Martin, April 3 -27. Shotgun Players.  Art by Yazmina Reza, through April 12. Staged Reading: How to Defend Yourself by Liliana Padilla, March 31, April 1, 7 pm. South Bay Musical Theatre: Titanic, a concert presentation, April 12-13. Brigadoon, May 17-June 7, Stagebridge: See website for events and productions. Storytime every 4th Saturday. The Breath Project. Streaming archive. The Marsh: Calendar listings for Berkeley, San Francisco and Marshstream. Theatre Lunatico  Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, April 26 – May 18. LaVal's Subterranean Theatre. Theatre Rhino  Gumiho by Nina Ki, April 17 – May 11.Streaming: Essential Services Project, conceived and performed by John Fisher, all weekly performances now available on demand. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. Happy Pleasant Valley, Book, Music, and Lyrics by Min Kahng, Lucie Stern Theatre, Palo Alto, March 5-30. The Heart-Sellers by Lloyd Suh, April 2-27. Word for Word.  See website for upcoming productions. Misc. Listings: BAM/PFA: On View calendar for Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive. Berkeley Symphony: See website for listings. Chamber Music San Francisco: Calendar, 2025 Season. Dance Mission Theatre. On stage events calendar. Fort Mason Center. Events calendar. Crushing, live monologue show, Feb. 27-28. Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Calendar listings and upcoming shows. San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus. Signs of Life? written and performed by Cheyenne Jackson, 2 performances February 14, Chan National Queer Arts Center. See schedule for upcoming SFGMC performances. San Francisco Opera. Calendar listings. San Francisco Symphony. Calendar listings. Filmed Live Musicals: Searchable database of all filmed live musicals, podcast, blog. If you'd like to add your bookstore or theater venue to this list, please write Richard@kpfa.org                                   .   . The post March 20, 2025: Anthony Lewis – Martin Amis appeared first on KPFA.

Martin Amis (1949-2023), in conversation with Richard Wolinsky, recorded in the KPFA studio on a book tour for “Lionel Asbo, State of England,” September 20, 2012. Novelist and essayist Martin Amis died of cancer on May 19, 2023 at the age of 73, leaving behind such novels as The Rachel Papers, London Fields, The Information, and his last memoir-cum-novel, Inside Story. On September 20, 2012, Richard Wolinsky conducted the fourth of five interviews with Martin Amis, discussing this satire about the nature of celebrity and celebrity culture. The post Martin Amis (1949-2023) IV, “Lionel Asbo, State of England,” 2012 appeared first on KPFA.

On this week's show, no amount of star power can save a “screamingly stupid show.” (Sorry, Robert De Niro et al.)  With Sam Adams—Slate Senior Editor and Staff Writer—sitting in for Dana, the team talks about the Netflix political thriller series Zero Day. Then they remember the career of Gene Hackman and end with their thoughts about this Atlantic article on navigating optimism during times of crisis. Endorsements: Julia: Moist Peanut Butter Cake Recipe from Cakes By MK Steve: The savage suburbia of Helen Garner: ‘I wanted to dong Martin Amis with a bat' by Sophie Elmhirst for The Guardian Sam: Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein (Again! After Julia endorsed it last week.) Podcast production and research by Vic Whitley-Berry. Email us at culturefest@slate.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week's show, no amount of star power can save a “screamingly stupid show.” (Sorry, Robert De Niro et al.)  With Sam Adams—Slate Senior Editor and Staff Writer—sitting in for Dana, the team talks about the Netflix political thriller series Zero Day. Then they remember the career of Gene Hackman and end with their thoughts about this Atlantic article on navigating optimism during times of crisis. Endorsements: Julia: Moist Peanut Butter Cake Recipe from Cakes By MK Steve: The savage suburbia of Helen Garner: ‘I wanted to dong Martin Amis with a bat' by Sophie Elmhirst for The Guardian Sam: Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein (Again! After Julia endorsed it last week.) Podcast production and research by Vic Whitley-Berry. Email us at culturefest@slate.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week's show, no amount of star power can save a “screamingly stupid show.” (Sorry, Robert De Niro et al.)  With Sam Adams—Slate Senior Editor and Staff Writer—sitting in for Dana, the team talks about the Netflix political thriller series Zero Day. Then they remember the career of Gene Hackman and end with their thoughts about this Atlantic article on navigating optimism during times of crisis. Endorsements: Julia: Moist Peanut Butter Cake Recipe from Cakes By MK Steve: The savage suburbia of Helen Garner: ‘I wanted to dong Martin Amis with a bat' by Sophie Elmhirst for The Guardian Sam: Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein (Again! After Julia endorsed it last week.) Podcast production and research by Vic Whitley-Berry. Email us at culturefest@slate.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week's show, no amount of star power can save a “screamingly stupid show.” (Sorry, Robert De Niro et al.)  With Sam Adams—Slate Senior Editor and Staff Writer—sitting in for Dana, the team talks about the Netflix political thriller series Zero Day. Then they remember the career of Gene Hackman and end with their thoughts about this Atlantic article on navigating optimism during times of crisis. Endorsements: Julia: Moist Peanut Butter Cake Recipe from Cakes By MK Steve: The savage suburbia of Helen Garner: ‘I wanted to dong Martin Amis with a bat' by Sophie Elmhirst for The Guardian Sam: Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein (Again! After Julia endorsed it last week.) Podcast production and research by Vic Whitley-Berry. Email us at culturefest@slate.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week's show, no amount of star power can save a “screamingly stupid show.” (Sorry, Robert De Niro et al.)  With Sam Adams—Slate Senior Editor and Staff Writer—sitting in for Dana, the team talks about the Netflix political thriller series Zero Day. Then they remember the career of Gene Hackman and end with their thoughts about this Atlantic article on navigating optimism during times of crisis. Endorsements: Julia: Moist Peanut Butter Cake Recipe from Cakes By MK Steve: The savage suburbia of Helen Garner: ‘I wanted to dong Martin Amis with a bat' by Sophie Elmhirst for The Guardian Sam: Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein (Again! After Julia endorsed it last week.) Podcast production and research by Vic Whitley-Berry. Email us at culturefest@slate.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week's show, no amount of star power can save a “screamingly stupid show.” (Sorry, Robert De Niro et al.)  With Sam Adams—Slate Senior Editor and Staff Writer—sitting in for Dana, the team talks about the Netflix political thriller series Zero Day. Then they remember the career of Gene Hackman and end with their thoughts about this Atlantic article on navigating optimism during times of crisis. Endorsements: Julia: Moist Peanut Butter Cake Recipe from Cakes By MK Steve: The savage suburbia of Helen Garner: ‘I wanted to dong Martin Amis with a bat' by Sophie Elmhirst for The Guardian Sam: Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein (Again! After Julia endorsed it last week.) Podcast production and research by Vic Whitley-Berry. Email us at culturefest@slate.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week's show, no amount of star power can save a “screamingly stupid show.” (Sorry, Robert De Niro et al.)  With Sam Adams—Slate Senior Editor and Staff Writer—sitting in for Dana, the team talks about the Netflix political thriller series Zero Day. Then they remember the career of Gene Hackman and end with their thoughts about this Atlantic article on navigating optimism during times of crisis. Endorsements: Julia: Moist Peanut Butter Cake Recipe from Cakes By MK Steve: The savage suburbia of Helen Garner: ‘I wanted to dong Martin Amis with a bat' by Sophie Elmhirst for The Guardian Sam: Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein (Again! After Julia endorsed it last week.) Podcast production and research by Vic Whitley-Berry. Email us at culturefest@slate.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

'It was not easy to find a poet in the United States in my reading,who wrote with the clarity and intelligence that Larkin possessed. I found him to be full of surprises..'My guest today is writer David Biespiel who was born in Texas and who is now Poet in residence at Oregan state university. He has written for numerous publications and reviewed poetry for the Washington Post and the New York Times. He has taught creative writing at university across the US., has won many awards and published several books of his own poetry. In preparation for talking to David, he recommended that I have a look at his book A Long High Whistle: Selected Columns on Poetry, published in 2015, which is a collection of his pithy and fascinating articles on poets and poetry.‘I love that they are slender, I love that they are pocket sized, the whole texture of them- the Faber books.'Larkin poems mentioned:Church Going, This Be The Verse, I Remember, I Remember, Dockery and Son, Talking In Bed, Sad Steps, Friday Night In the Royal Station Hotel, Broadcast, An Arundel Tomb, The MowerPoets:John Ashberry, Walt Whitman, TS Eliot, Thom Gunn, Keats, Chaucer, Donne, Elizabeth Bishop, Herbert, Sylvia Plath, Robert Frost, William Stafford, Henry Allenhttps://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1989/06/03/philip-larkins-everyday-poetry/1a53b1df-d319-43fc-9249-af52238ced60/The Paris Review, Archie Burnett, Martin Amis and Anthony Thwaite collections, US/UK poetry, railway journeys, rhyme schemes, literary tours of UK/Italyhttps://www.amazon.co.uk/Long-High-Whistle-David-Biespiel/dp/1938308107“The past is never dead. It's not even past.”  William Faulkner, Requiem for a Nun (1950)For more about Larkin's Coventry, please watch: Philip Pullen's fantastic 2022 talk at the PLS AGM in Coventry at Larkin's school King Henry VII School.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDOqZ4N_fUk&t=3106s

Send us a textJason welcomes hunky singer-songwriter Lee Shedden for a vast ramble about getting drunk in Calgary, how books are bullshit, Martin Amis, listening to KISS on the Gravitron, the glory of Gillian Welch, & how Jason was the worst influence on wee young Lee. There isn't much old literary shit, but the episode is studded—in every way—with some of Lee's early musical shit, some mid-period shit, & some of his most recent shit, which is totally ace & which you should buy when it comes out. Join the early sh*t chat at https://www.facebook.com/WRTESpodcast & on Instagram @writersreadtheirearlyshit. Thanks to Wayne Emde for the artwork, Joe Emde for help with the intro, DJ Max in Tokyo for the intro music, and you, wherever & whoever & however you are, for listening. Support the show

Ya en el aire el septuagésimo tercer episodio de Cierra al libro al salir, el del jardín de los impostores. En él, os recomendamos diez libros que no hemos leído con el aplomo propio de un par de impostores y después jugamos a las adivinanzas literarias con muy poco éxito porque, aunque parezca que sabemos de libros, es todo impostura. ¡Ah! Acordaos de leer el cuento Los cantores, de Iván Turgénev, para poder desmenuzarlo en el próximo episodio. Lo podéis leer aquí https://encr.pw/lIuZO  Presentación: al principio. Recomendación de una web: minuto 4:00. En www.3books.co tienes un proyecto de entrevistas a escritores muy interesante. Recomendaciones literarias: minuto 6:00.  Las recomendaciones de Ana: Antártida (Claire Keegan), Niños muertos (Martin Amis), Los niños perdidos (Valeria Luiselli), El maravilloso viaje de Nils Holgersson (Selma Lagerlöff) y Todos nuestros ayeres (Natlia Ginzburg). Las recomendaciones de Fernando: Poeta X (Elizabeth Acevedo), El día de la liberación (George Saunders), Chicas muertas (Selva Almada), Diarios alfabéticos (Sheila Heti) y El salvaje (Guillermo Arriaga) Fernando se mete en un jardín por impostor: minuto 14:00. Adelantamos que al final sabe salir. Juego literario: minuto 20:00. Adelantamos que la victoria es para Ana. Despedida: al final. Puedes comprar los libros de los que te hablamos donde te apetezca, pero nosotros te sugerimos que lo hagas a través de una pequeña librería y que te dejes aconsejar por los libreros. La sintonía del programa es de Charles Matuschewski y el logo del programa de Ana Nuria Corral. Las cortinillas animadas son de Jara Vicente. La traducción sincronizada de Elvira Barrio Cualquier sugerencia o crítica, incluso malintencionada, la podéis enviar a hola@cierraellibroalsalir.com. Búscanos en facebook (sobre todo), o en twitter o en instagram o en youtube, prometemos contestar lo antes posible. Esto es todo por hoy. Dentro de un mes, otro episodio. ¡No te olvides! Cierra el libro al salir. #recomendacionesliterarias #relatos #literatura

James Marriott discusses with Ivan six things which should be better known. James Marriott is a columnist at The Times, writing about society, culture and ideas. The poetry of Geoffrey Hill https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v07/n06/tom-paulin/the-case-for-geoffrey-hill CAT S22 Flip https://www.reddit.com/r/dumbphones/comments/16p2an2/cat_s22_flip_reviewjustwow/?rdt=55955 Uzbekistan https://www.wildfrontierstravel.com/en_GB/blog/places-to-visit-in-uzbekistan The acronym WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich and Democratic) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_WEIRDest_People_in_the_World The War Against Cliche by Martin Amis https://www.theguardian.com/books/2001/apr/14/fiction.martinamis Rossini's opera L'Italiana in Algeri https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPodHwCbE5k&pp=ygUQI2l0YWxpYW5hZW5hcmdlbA%3D%3D This podcast is powered by ZenCast.fm

Dotun and Tim are joined by Paul Sarahs to discuss football and everything in between. Is darts a real sport? Author, Martin Amis had his doubts...

English novelist Anthony Quinn has met and interviewed Martin Amis on several occasions. Their first encounter followed the publication of London Fields in 1989, the second during the publicity storm that came with Amis's 1995 novel The Information.In this episode, he and Jack discuss Amis's last novel, Inside Story, published in 2020. Although Anthony struggled with it in his first reading, he later came to consider it a masterful valedictory that encompasses all the best and worst of Amis as a man, and as a writer. Described by some as 'The Big Book of Mart', Inside Story is part memoir, part novel, and part writing manual. As well as revising Amis's final words of wisdom and warning to writers, Anthony and Jack cover the great romantic and literary loves of Amis's life, from Saul Bellow and his godfather Phillip Larkin, to the inimitable Christopher Hitchens. Crucially, Anthony reveals who he believes Amis loved most of all the people in his life. FOLLOW US ON TWITTER/ X: @mymartinamis

It's over already!?!?!? Man, I was just starting to warm to this Mark Knopfler Guy! We plunged into some serious waters again for a spell this week, talked about douchebags and how we might resquence this final Dire Straits record to make it just a wee bit punchier. You know, because we definitely know better than one of the most gifted songwriters of all time. Does Corey run on heavy fuel? Has he read Martin Amis? What does Kev think of televangelists and will he close the gap on Corey as a consolation prize to end the season?The only way to find out is to turn on, tune in, and run on heavy heavy fuel (the secret's in the cheese...)!Songs covered in this episode: "Heavy Fuel", "Iron Hand", "Ticket to Heaven", "My Parties", "Planet of New Orleans", "How Long"Don't forget to follow us on social media and leave us a rating/review if you're enjoying the show!Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/UltimateCatalogueClashTwitter: https://twitter.com/UCatalogueClashBluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ucatalogueclash.bsky.social Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

British author, journalist and war correspondent David Patrikarakos was due to leave the UK for Athens in the summer of 2024. Before he left, he discovered My Martin Amis, and quickly got in touch to ask to tell his story about how he became, as he put it, "mildly obsessed" with the late novelist.On this episode, David and Jack sit down together early one morning to revisit The Rachel Papers, Amis's first novel and one previously discussed on episode 4 with journalist and author Zoe Strimpel. David explains that he discovered the novel on his family bookshelf at the age of 14. The opening line from Charles Highway was a slam dunk: "simple and declarative and clever". From that point on, David was an Amis fan.David also describes an antique copy of Hamlet he bought that once belonged to Amis as an undergraduate. The book contains Amis's marginalia. For more on that, you'll have to listen to the conversation. Needless to say, Amis was a precocious student who never stopped overachieving in later life, much to the chagrin of his global peers and critics.David and Jack also discuss Amis's famous friendship with the late essayist Christopher Hitchens, with whom Amis shared much of his life, even the same cause of death. Were he to have the job of teaching a class of journalism students for a year, David says he would have no problem replacing Hitchens with Amis on the reading list. Amis's The War Against Cliche aside, being "alive to the possibilities of prose" is essential to any writer, he says. Yes, Amis can be over-prescriptive at times, but by letting him guide you for a period, you soon discover what it is writing does that no other art form can do.The important thing, as ever, is to learn from Martin Amis, then go your own way.FOLLOW US ON TWITTER/ X: @mymartinamis Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, We explore the fascinating world of J.G. Ballard's provocative works, what might later be known as Climate Fiction, written mostly last century. From his early novel "The Drowned World" to the controversial "Crash," we delve into how Ballard's dystopian visions have shaped the genre. We feature insights from a PBS show Hot Mess, a short BBC film Ballard appeared in 1973 exploring his experimental novel of linked short stories called “The Atrocity Exhibition,” and a 2006 South Bank Show interview. We discuss the psychological and societal impacts of Climate Fiction, and how it might inspire change in an era of environmental urgency. First we begin with a 2019 clip from Hot Mess from PBS, featuring Lindsay Ellis, of It's Lit, and Amy Brady, the editor-in-chief of The Chicago Review of Books. Hot Mess | The Rise of Climate Fiction feat. Lindsay Ellis & Amy Brady | Episode 35 | PBS https://www.pbs.org/video/the-rise-of-climate-fiction-feat-lindsay-ellis-amy-brady-2s2sxh/ The Atrocity Exhibition is J.G. Ballard's instruction manual on how to disrupt mass media and recontextualize technology in a dystopian landscape overrun with industrial waste and technological white noise. The excerpt is from a 1973 BBC film directed by Harely Cokliss and features Ballard talking about car crash fetishism and the response to the bleak modern landscapes dominated by industrial monotony and the irrational violence of the technology-infused world which would coalesce into his controversial novel Crash, published in 1973. https://youtu.be/QRxpZ142lkI?si=gh5FjzV9BrUvs-r0 The next clip is a 2006 interview of JG Ballard by Melvyn Bragg on the South Bank Show, which also features prominent British authors Will Self, Iain Sinclair, and Martin Amis. https://youtu.be/le0tW1y609w?si=2DeFYxI-wqGe-Cu8 For an extended interview and other benefits, become an EcoJustice Radio patron at https://www.patreon.com/ecojusticeradio Resources/Articles: https://wilderutopia.com/performance/literary/j-g-ballard-atrocity-exhibition-modernist-motorcar-dystopia/ James Graham Ballard who lived between 1930 and 2009 was an English novelist and short-story writer known for psychologically provocative works that explore relations between human psychology, technology, sex and mass media. Ballard's original climate fiction work from 1962 was the post-apocalyptic New Wave science fiction novel The Drowned World. He followed with the controversial 1970 short-story collection The Atrocity Exhibition, which includes the 1968 story "Why I Want to F- Ronald Reagan", and later the 1973 novel Crash (1973), a story about car-crash fetishists. In 1984, Ballard won broad critical recognition for the war novel Empire of the Sun, a semi-autobiographical story of the experiences of a British boy during the Japanese occupation of Shanghai;[4] three years later, the American film director Steven Spielberg adapted the novel into a film of the same name. From the distinct nature of the literary fiction of J. G. Ballard arose the adjective Ballardian, defined as: "resembling or suggestive of dystopian modernity, bleak man-made landscapes, and the psychological effects of technological, social or environmental developments." Jack Eidt is an urban planner, environmental journalist, and climate organizer, as well as award-winning fiction writer. He is Co-Founder of SoCal 350 Climate Action and Executive Producer of EcoJustice Radio. He is also Founder and Publisher of WilderUtopia [https://wilderutopia.com], a website dedicated to the question of Earth sustainability, finding society-level solutions to environmental, community, economic, transportation and energy needs.

VOICES IN THE EVENING by Natalia Ginzburg (trans. DM Low), chosen by Tessa Hadley THE ZONE OF INTEREST by Martin Amis (trans. Jessica Moore), chosen by Sebastian Faulks EASTBOUND by Maylis de Kerangal, chosen by Harriett GilbertTwo authors pick books they love with Harriett Gilbert.Tessa Hadley (Late In The Day, Free Love, After The Funeral) takes us to post-war Italy with Voices In The Evening by Natalia Ginzburg. The drama, suffering and fascism are in the past, but traumas surface in the day-to-day, with first loves and lost chances.Sebastian Faulks (Birdsong, Human Traces, The Seventh Son) chooses The Zone of Interest by Martin Amis, after watching the hit film by Jonathan Glazer and wanting to read the book it was inspired by. The haunting novel follows a Nazi officer who has become enamoured with the Auschwitz camp commandant's wife, and goes inside the minds of the commandant, who lives with his family right next to the concentration camp.Harriett Gilbert brings Eastbound by Maylis de Kerangal, a gripping novella set on the Trans-Siberian Railway, with a chance encounter between a desperate Russian conscript and a French woman.Produced by Eliza Lomas for BBC Audio Bristol Join the conversation on Instagram @bbcagoodread

Access this entire 99 minute episode (and additional monthly bonus shows every month) by becoming a Junk Filter patron! Over 30% of episodes are exclusively available to patrons of the show. https://www.patreon.com/posts/162-zone-of-with-100893723 The writer James Slaymaker, author of Time is Luck: The Cinema of Michael Mann, returns to the pod from Southampton to discuss Jonathan Glazer's The Zone of Interest. In this wide-ranging conversation James and I discuss Glazer's methodology to adapt Martin Amis' Holocaust novel for the screen, including his determination to create two separate films inside one film: what we see (the bucolic family life of Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Höss) and what we hear (the horrifying sounds of death from over the wall of the concentration camp next door). Glazer uses 21st century technology to tell this story to indicate that this film is not about history, but about the present moment, including provocative ideas about the ways we all try to compartmentalize and overcompensate to tune out the horrors of the world that make our own comfortable lives possible.  We also compare The Zone of Interest to other Holocaust works to discuss why it's so difficult to tell these stories with sensitivity and respect and without compromise, some of the most noteworthy sequences, and what the film has in common with Alain Resnais' masterful short film about Auschwitz, Night and Fog.  And of course we discuss some of the bad faith arguments from Zone of Interest haters, and some hot takes online from people who even if they saw and liked it, may not have grasped its point. Night and Fog is currently streaming on the Criterion Channel. Follow James Slaymaker on Twitter. James' book Time is Luck: The Cinema of Michael Mann, is now available in paperback and Kindle. Trailer #2 for The Zone of Interest (Glazer, 2023)

The Oscar-nominated film The Zone of Interest is one of the most acclaimed and talked about films of 2024. Directed by Jonathan Glazer and loosely based on a novel of the same name by Martin Amis, The Zone of Interest focuses on the life of Rudolf Höss and his family during the Second World War, when he was commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp. In today's episode, Professor Richard J Evans, one of the world's leading experts on Nazi Germany, speaks to Rob Attar about the real story of Rudolf Höss. He also offers his thoughts on the film and recounts his experience of working with Martin Amis on the original book. The HistoryExtra podcast is produced by the team behind BBC History Magazine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, two conversations with Martin Amis, one of England's most engaged and provocative writers. In 2014, Amis spoke with Eleanor Wachtel about his novel The Zone of Interest, which focuses on the Holocaust from a different angle. Its screen adaptation is nominated for five Oscars, including Best Picture. Followed by a conversation from 2019 about the Italian Jewish chemist, Holocaust survivor and writer, Primo Levi — whose work greatly inspired Amis's writing — featuring Levi's biographer Ian Thomson. Please note: this episode contains difficult subject matter and discussion of suicide.

It's Superbowl Sunday, but somehow we don't think Jonathan Glazer's adaptation of Martin Amis' "The Zone of Interest" makes any references to the end zone. Join us and special guest Will Tempfer as we reach peak virtual insanity discussing the horrifying details of complicity in the process of the holocaust. Please reach out to us via email at onlymoviepodcast@gmail.com or via Twitter (X) or InstagramAs always, you can catch our episodes early and ad free over on Nebula. And if you sign up with the link below, it really helps out the pod!https://go.nebula.tv/theonlypodcastaboutmoviesSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Vintage Contemporaries by Dan Kois is a fiction debut that blends a coming-of-age story with the themes of lasting friendship and what it takes to be an artist. Kois joins us to talk about the publisher that inspired the novel's title, some of the important influences on his work, what he does in his day jobs and more with Miwa Messer, host of Poured Over.    This episode of Poured Over was hosted by Executive Producer Miwa Messer and mixed by Harry Liang.                   New episodes land Tuesdays and Thursdays (with occasional Saturdays) here and on your favorite podcast app.         Featured Books (Episode):  Vintage Contemporaries by Dan Kois  Asa, as I Knew Him by Susanna Kaysen  Bad Behavior by Mary Gaitskill   Home Cooking by Laurie Colwin  Happy All the Time by Laurie Colwin   I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home by Lorrie Moore  Angels in America by Tony Kushner  The World Only Spins Forward by Isaac Butler & Dan Kois  Eat Your Mind by Jason McBride  The Zone of Interest by Martin Amis  The Fraud by Zadie Smith  The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride 

For this week's second podcast review, I am joined by Josh Parham, Dan Bayer & Tom O'Brien. Today, we are reviewing the newest film from director Jonathan Glazer, "The Zone Of Interest," starring Christian Friedel and Sandra Hüller. Already hailed as a masterpiece since its world premiere at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival, the film is the British entry for Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards. What do we think of the direction from Glazer, how he adapted the 2014 Martin Amis novel of the same name, the film's themes, its performances, cinematography, and sound work? Tune in as we discuss these elements, its awards season chances, and more in our SPOILER-FILLED review. Thank you, and enjoy! Check out more on NextBestPicture.com Please subscribe on... SoundCloud - https://soundcloud.com/nextbestpicturepodcast Apple Podcasts - https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/negs-best-film-podcast/id1087678387?mt=2 Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/7IMIzpYehTqeUa1d9EC4jT YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWA7KiotcWmHiYYy6wJqwOw And be sure to help support us on Patreon for as little as $1 a month at https://www.patreon.com/NextBestPicture Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Moore is the subject of a new HBO (MAX) documentary that explores her rise in Hollywood — from her 1970s hit The Mary Tyler Moore Show, which inspired a generation of single professional women, to her 1960s breakout role on The Dick Van Dyke Show. She spoke with Terry Gross in 1995. Also, we remember novelist, essayist and literary critic Martin Amis, who died last week at 73. Film critic Justin Chang reviews the new live-action remake of The Little Mermaid.

Ukraine insists heavy fighting is still going on in besieged city. Also: A senior Cambodian opposition leader says democracy will be over if the constitutional court upholds his party's electoral disqualification, and the famous British author Martin Amis has died of cancer at the age of 73.